Written by Charles Gibbs   
Friday, 14 March 2008

Dear Friends, 
Greetings of love and peace.
As a non-governmental organization with consultative status at the UN, the URI has a responsibility to support initiatives that further key UN objectives and are consistent with URI's Preamble, Purpose and Principles.
In January, I shared with you URI's involvement in an effort to have the UN declare a Decade of Interreligious Dialogue and Cooperation for Peace. I would now like to share with you two other initiatives the URI has been asked to participate in related to fulfilling the UN's Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

First, a reminder that the eight MDGs were approved as part of the Millennium Declaration, affirmed by 189 countries and signed by 147 heads of states and governments in during the UN Millennium Summit in September 2000. The eight goals, to be achieved by 2015, are:

Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education
Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
Goal 5: Improve maternal health
Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability
Goal 8: Develop a Global Partnership for Development 
The first initiative that the URI is engaged in will focus on addressing goals 1 and 2 through the work of the Women, Faith and Development Alliance (WFDA). The goal of WFDA is to increase investments for women and girls around the world as a key strategy for ending global poverty and achieving the Millennium Development Goals. Because of the potential of URI's global network to be a significant part of this alliance, I have been asked to serve on URI's behalf on the Leadership Council for WFDA, which will host a major conference, "Breakthrough: Women, Faith, and Development Summit to End Global Poverty", in Washington, DC, 13-14 April 2008. Co-chairs for the conference include:

• · The Honorable Madeleine Albright, Former U.S. Secretary of State;
• · The Right Honourable Kim Campbell, Former Prime Minister, Canada
• · Her Excellency Mary Robinson, Former President, Republic of Ireland
• · Her Majesty Queen Noor of Jordan, Chair, King Hussein Foundation (Honorary)
• · Her Excellency Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, President, Republic of Liberia (Honorary)
• · His Grace Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Anglican Archbishop Emeritus, South Africa (Honorary)
• · Dr. Muhammad Yunus, Founder, Grameen Bank, Bangladesh (Honorary)
• · Sheikh Shaban Mubaje, Grand Mufti, Uganda Muslim Supreme Council 

I invite you to visit the WFDA website (www.wfd-alliance.org ) over the next few weeks and to share your thoughts about how your CC and the global URI might contribute to this important effort.

The second initiative URI has been invited to participate in, "Point 7 Now", involves an interfaith coalition calling on the government of the United States to dramatically increase its foreign aid to help eliminate extreme poverty. Here is an excerpt from a statement by this project:  

"The World Bank estimates that 1.1 billion people live in extreme poverty. These people get by on less than $1 per day. This means they cannot meet basic needs for survival. They are chronically hungry; unable to get health care, lack safe drinking water and sanitation, cannot afford rudimentary shelter and basic articles of clothing. This is poverty that kills. Eight million people die each year because they are too poor to survive.

"Fortunately, President Bush signed the 2002 Monterey Consensus, which urged all developed countries that have not done so to provide 0.7% of income as official developmental assistance. Five nations are already at or above that level. (The United States is currently at 0.2%.) The phrase "Point 7 Now" refers to the commitment made by developed countries to increase foreign aid to poor countries to 0.7% of a developed country's national income. At the same time, poor developing countries have promised reforms to improve transparency, democracy and anti-corruption efforts to ensure that increased foreign aid would reduce poverty. 

"We are asking our federal legislators for real and effective support for increasing the amount of aid that the United States provides so that the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals can be implemented and the goal of eliminating the worst of the world's poverty can be accomplished by 2015....
"When one of us suffers, all suffer. We cannot stand idly by while sisters and brothers on our planet; especially the children are dying because they have little or no basic necessities for life. 
"As a nation, [the US] spends 1.5 billion dollars a day for war. 1.5 billion dollars would be equal to five years of malaria protection for all of Africa.

"We, as people of faith, hear the call of these people and we urge all of our memberships to join in asking Congress to keep America's promise and raise the amount of aid we provide to these poorest of the poor to .7% of our national income." 

I invite all URI CCs in the United States to explore how they might participate in this important initiative, which can be of great benefit to the world. I'll work with URI's Coordinator for North America, Margi Ness, to explore how best to share more information about "Point 7 Now".
I pray this finds all you receive this well and your work for peace, justice and healing flourishing.

 
Love, 
Charles
The Rev. Canon Charles P. Gibbs 
Executive Director