Why We Serve - Compassion Week 2019





Compassion Week is a week where we strive to answer the question of why we serve. It took place here at CCF March 4th - March 10th, where we focused on different poverty issues that impact the lives of people here in America and across the world. Together we learned, experienced, grew, and acted as we explored different topics and put ourselves in the shoes of our neighbors. Over the week we:


  • Had an opening ceremony to start off this excellent week at 9AM at CCF on Monday, March 4th

  • Initiated meaningful conversations by wearing nametags with interesting statistics on them

  • Participated in attempting to fast (or give up) something for each day and experience some of these issues we talked about

  • Concluded the week by visiting the King Center on March 10th





Days of the Week




Education
No Google | March 4th

Did you know that 93% of the poorest school districts in America have test scores below the national average? Likewise, only 1.6% of the richest school districts in America have mean test scores at or below the national average. (Sources: 1, 2). On Monday, we talked about the state of education in America - what's good, what's not so good, what we can do to help and why we want to serve!

We gave up Google (or the ability to utilize an online search engine) for the day to help us get the conversation going.



Electricity
No Power | March 5th

After Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico in September of 2017, its 3.4 million residents lost power, and 7 months later 100,000 of those residents still lacked power. It took 11 months to fully restore electricity, and it was deemed the largest blackout in U.S. history (and the second largest in world history). (Sources: 1, 2). There are many other Americans that go without electricity as a way of life or because of a natural disaster, and on Tuesday we highlighted what it means to have no electricity available for use.

Cafè Unplugged was Tuesday at 8pm, and for the whole day we attempted to not use electricity.



Health
No Food | March 6th

40 million people in the United States of America are food insecure, including 12 million children (meaning they have limited or uncertain availability to nutritionally adequate and safe foods). (Sources: 1, 2). Health issues, ranging from malnutrition problems to mental health obstacles, are still very real in America, and there are certainly real solutions that we talked about on Wednesday.

At CCF at 12pm as we gave up a meal for a "No Lunch But Learn" with Derek Sweatman from Atlanta Christian Church and learned about important ways we can help right here at home.



Housing
No Shelter | March 7th

The bad news is that over 500,000 Americans are homeless (as of 2017). The good news is that more and more of these people are able to transition to having permenant shelter and housing, and it's getting better each year! (Sources: 1, 2). On Thursday we talked about tackling housing issues, and you're invited to be a part of that conversation!

On Thursday Night at CCF for our hunger banquet at 6:45PM where we experienced what is like to not be as blessed with our availability of food (note: prepare for this to be an abnormal meal). Our after-activity for the night was a sleepout in the North Ave Quad where we had fun together and get a taste of being out in the elements for a night!



Water & Sanitation
No Water | March 8th

Clean water is a basic human right, but 14 million American households (or roughly 12% of households) struggle to pay for clean water (as of 2014). This is a number that is trending upward as affordability of clean water is decreasing for many households in America. (Sources: 1, 2). On Friday we talked about water and sanitation problems and solutions and what we can do make clean water more available to our neighbors and the world.

On Friday as we tried to learn and grow together by living off of only 1 gallon of water for the day.



The King Center
Spectrum Trip | March 10th

To conclude this week of learning, growing, experiencing, and doing, we went to The King Center as a part of Spectrum!