Lord have mercy.  Christ have mercy.  Lord have mercy.

The other day I read an article about some 43,000 children in this area who have been hungry since the first snowfall over a week ago.

I have been so busy working, even with the office closed, to keep up with all that I have to do since I was out ill for two weeks that I never once thought of the children on the free lunch program in this area.  With schools closed all week, they went hungry.  And today was yet another day without food as we celebrated President's Day. 

Here I was so upset thinking about them getting through the summer that I never stopped to consider how often we have four-day school weeks or the winter holidays or Spring break.  What is it like to long for school because being able to go means being able to eat.

With many local food pantries also closed due to back-to-back blizzards, those children and their families had little recourse. 

I never once thought about them even though I have been praying about hunger in America since this fall, still fervently hoping our church might step forward and start to act in mercy to address this blight in our country.

Lord have mercy.  Christ have mercy.  Lord have mercy.