{"id":1017,"date":"2018-12-03T18:54:23","date_gmt":"2018-12-03T18:54:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/new.brethren.org\/messenger\/?p=1017"},"modified":"2019-08-07T18:59:07","modified_gmt":"2019-08-07T18:59:07","slug":"the-luxury-of-helping","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/living-simply\/the-luxury-of-helping\/","title":{"rendered":"The luxury of helping"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What do a bathroom faucet, a bowl of ice cream, and a wedding have in common?<\/strong> How about a shower, cat food, and a garage door opener?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the past 40 years, Global Women\u2019s Project participants have charged themselves a \u201cluxury tax\u201d for each of these. \u201cLuxury\u201d in this case reflects not the dictionary definition of \u201cabundance and extravagance,\u201d but rather recognition that not everyone enjoys equal comforts. In a world where 2.5 billion people lack access to improved sanitation, indoor plumbing can be considered a luxury.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the speech that launched the Global Women\u2019s Project in 1978, Ruthann Knechel Johansen said:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Our high consumption of industrialized goods\u2014the highest in the world\u2014also contributes to global inequities. . . . In Latin America, land that could be used to grow food to feed the poor is instead used to produce goods for export such as coffee, carnations, and roses. . . . Because we live on the top of the world economically, politically, militarily, educationally, it is easy not to see the effects of our lives and choices on others. . . . But when we look at the globe as a total unit, we are forced to conclude that, relatively speaking, we belong to the oppressor class. By accident of birth, not by divine design, we are part of the privileged.
“There are at least two ways we can deal with the disquieting reality that we live in an interdependent order acting as if we were free, isolated persons or nation. One way is to try to extend the privileges of the privileged. . . . The second way is that we can become one with the oppressed and undergo a radical conversion, with the grace of God, of our own personal and social priorities. . . .
“By choosing voluntarily to live simply, to resist our culture\u2019s consumption patterns that make hostility and armaments essential, and to redirect the resources over which we have control into meeting the basic needs of two-thirds of the world\u2019s people we can, corporately, make our convictions felt in the world.” <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne of my favorite aspects is the education about our wealth and privilege and donating that money to make a positive impact,\u201d says steering committee member Tina Rieman. \u201cIt\u2019s a good mindfulness exercise.\u201d She first heard about the luxury tax after camping, without free access to showers. For 12 years, she donated money for each shower she took. \u201cIt made me mindful of that luxury and how much water I use,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Former steering committee member Anna Lisa Gross explains, \u201cOur mission has, is, and will continue to be inviting all women to live in solidarity with women around the world, seeking to empower women and girls in their own communities in living a life of dignity and respect.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gross is one of several mother- daughter and sister legacies on the steering committee: Louie Baldwin Rieman and Tina Rieman, Rachel Gross and Anna Lisa Gross, and sisters Lois Grove and Pearl Miller.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur partnerships with women- led organizations around the world grow out of relationships, too\u201d says Gross. \u201cWe\u2019re Brethren, after all!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Has the concept worked?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Johansen recalls, \u201cOn the 20th anniversary of the Global Women\u2019s Project, I asked for a record of contributors. Although the list was not complete, several things surprised me. For example, there were several contributions from establishments like pizza restaurants or other commercial establishments. I was most moved by the wide variety of individual women and men, women\u2019s groups both within and outside the Church of the Brethren, and congregations across wide theological perspectives who had joined in giving birth to a world more consistent with God\u2019s reality, mercy, and justice.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pearl Miller reflects on the changes over the years. \u201cHopefully we have made changes within ourselves that have moved us to be more creative and proactive for the benefit of girls and women wherever they may be. Through small grants from Global Women\u2019s Project, women around the world have been given assistance so that they can establish cooperative businesses, send their children to school, move away from lives of domestic violence, incarceration, or economic uncertainty, and work toward more just societies based on human values, equality, and peace.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Cultural Academy for Peace (CAP) in Kerala, India. Photo courtesy of Global Women’s Project<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is a gift to know that so many have been touched with ways to access education, provide for their families, and promote community,\u201d says steering committee member Carla Kilgore. \u201cIt also touches me to know the amazing women from the Church of the Brethren who have reached out to others to reflect on how reducing our luxuries can allow us to partner with others so that more of us can thrive.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs a fully volunteer-led organization we\u2019ve struggled with stamina, focus, and energy over these 40 years,\u201c admits Gross. \u201cAt least twice the steering committee has considered, \u2018Is this the time to lay GWP down?\u2019 and the answer, so far, has been \u2018no!\u2019 Even though our grants to women-led community projects seem small to us (often $1,500 per year), this money goes far in many places.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have the energy to see this through and continue it beyond 40 years,\u201d concludes Rieman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What do a bathroom faucet, a bowl of ice cream, and a wedding have in common?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":1018,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[81,20],"class_list":["post-1017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-living-simply","tag-jan-fischer-bachman","tag-living-simply"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1017"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1017\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1021,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1017\/revisions\/1021"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}