Singer's point

Christian Century, July 31, 2002 by Joyce P. Regier

I WAS DELIGHTED that you published Mark Oppenheimer's article about Peter Singer ("Who lives? Who dies?," July 3-10). However, I fear that Oppenheimer and some of the commentators in the article have missed Singer's point: we are not doing what we say we believe.

If it takes $200 for UNICEF or ENFAM to give a child in the developing world a chance to live to age six, then why are we not giving our resources to prevent the 34,000 child deaths that occur (on average) every day? We in the U.S. spent $376 billion on food and drink outside the home in 2000. Less than 1 percent of that amount ($2.5 billion) would keep millions of children alive.

We as Christians cannot come to any kind of agreement on the morality of the death penalty; consequently, ours is one of the few industrialized nations that still exercise it. We have one of the most punitive welfare systems, one that refuses federal aid to children of parents whose time limit for aid has run out. What about the ethical implications of this? Why do we think we can escape criticism when we own 59 percent of the world's wealth and waste it on luxuries?

Singer knows that our God lives in our pocketbooks and portfolios. Until we acknowledge that and change our behavior, we are noisy gongs and clanging symbols.

Joyce P. Regier
Jamesville, N. Y.