April – June 2006
On the Edge of the Inside:
Prophets Then, Prophets Now

God Is with the Poor

By Bono

Look, whatever thoughts you have about God, who He is or if He exists, most will agree that if there is a God, He has a special place for the poor. In fact, the poor are where God lives.

Check Judaism. Check Islam. Check pretty much anyone.

I mean, God may well be with us in our mansions on the hill. I hope so. He may well be with us as in all manner of controversial stuff. Maybe—maybe not. But the one thing on which we can all agree, all faiths and ideologies, is that God is with the vulnerable and poor.

God is in the slums, in the cardboard boxes where the poor play house. God is in the silence of a mother who has infected her child with a virus that will end both their lives. God is in the cries heard under the rubble of war. God is in the debris of wasted opportunity and lives, and God is with us if we are with them. “If you remove the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger and speaking wickedness, and if you give yourself to the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then your light will rise in darkness and your gloom will become like midday and the Lord will continually guide you and satisfy your desire in scorched places.”

It’s not a coincidence that in the scriptures, poverty is mentioned more than 2,100 times. It’s not an accident. That’s a lot of air time, 2,100 mentions. (You know, the only time Christ is judgmental is on the subject of the poor.) “As you have done it unto the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me” (Matthew 25:40). As I say, good news to the poor.

Here’s some good news for the president. After 9/11 we were told America would have no time for the world’s poor. America would be taken up with its own problems of safety. And it’s true these are dangerous times, but America has not drawn the blinds and double-locked the doors.

This article was excerpted from the 54th Annual National Prayer Breakfast speech given by Bono at the Hotel Washington in Washington, D.C., on February 2, 2006. Used with permission of the DATA Foundation. The speech is available in its entirety on the DATA web site.

Bono, lead singer of U2, is a social activist who has become increasingly committed to campaigning for third-world debt relief. He is a co-founder of DATA and a major supporter of The One Campaign.

If you enjoyed what you read, please consider joining the growing community of CAC friends and supporters by making a financial contribution. In return, you will receive a year’s worth (four quarterly issues) of Radical Grace.