EAST AFRICA -- As Western countries continue to focus on the needs of men, women and children trapped in the web of Africa’s poverty, more and more people are asking what it means to be poor?

For those who are struggling to survive in dozens of nations across the African continent, being poor means being hungry. Poverty means a lack of shelter. It means being sick and not having the money needed to see a doctor. Being poor means not being able to pay the school fees required for a formal education -- and therefore, not knowing how to read or write. Being poor means not having a job -- and so being fearful of the future . . . being forced to live one day at a time, searching through garbage to find another bite of food each day.

For those who are parents in Africa -- men and women who must care for children as well as themselves -- being poor means constantly being worried. Too many parents in Africa know the loss of a child to illness brought about by unclean water. They are poor -- and powerless, lacking representation in government and being forced to live without freedom.

Poor and Alone

Poverty in Africa continues to claim lives !

SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA -- According to a recent United Nations’ report, “30,000 children die each day due to poverty. They die quietly in some of the poorest villages on earth, far removed from the scrutiny and the conscience of the world. Being meek and weak in life makes these dying multitudes even more invisible in death.” On an average about 210,000 children are dying each week, or just under 11 million children under five years of age, each year. It is a tragedy beyond understanding or comprehension! And for the most part, the majority of these deaths will occur in Africa.

Political instability and wars have also contributed to the depth of Africa’s poverty. As a result of these wars as well as the famine and drought that have plagued the continent, the number of people living in extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa grew from 217 million in 1987 to more than 300 million in 1998.

“We have to be a little outraged that there are over billion people living in extreme poverty in the world,” a recent advisor to the United Nations recently stated. “The problem in Africa isn’t a lack of will. It isn’t a lack of desire to live. It’s the poverty trap!”

“Our missionaries have witnessed it first-hand for more than a century,” Fr. John Lynch went on to explain. Fr. Lynch is a Missionary of Africa working in the society’s Washington, DC, office. “We have seen what poverty does to one generation after another. When the poverty cycle -- or trap -- is not broken, it will continue to claim lives. If a parent is not educated, then he or she cannot earn money to provide education for their children. And so the cycle continues. It is our sincere hope that our work to provide education -- as well as the basic necessities of life -- will help families break free from the poverty that is killing them.”