Pewee Valley church has big desire to fight world poverty

from The Courier Journal

Concert, fair planned to raise awareness

By Christopher Hall
Special to The Courier-Journal

St. James Episcopal is a small church in Pewee Valley that wants to make a big difference around the world.

St. James is holding the first annual B.E.A.T. World Poverty Concert and Fair today from 1-7 p.m. to help raise awareness and support for the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, aimed at reducing hunger, disease and poverty.

The Episcopal Church worldwide has thrown its support behind the development goals, and St. James wants to do its part.

The Rev. Paul Jeanes, rector at St. James, said that after a meeting last year in Scotland with members of two companion churches, he came back to the church energized to do something.

One of the companion churches was in Scotland, and the other was in Byumba, in the Episcopal Diocese of Rwanda.

"It was out of this meeting and out of that partnership that I came back from Scotland with the idea that we needed to do more … and the biggest piece of that is, Number One, to get the word out of the devastating effects of poverty, and, Number Two, that we could actually do something to address it," Jeanes said.

"Even though we're a fairly small parish in Pewee Valley, Kentucky, of all places, even here we can make a difference across the globe," Jeanes said. "We can impact the lives of people thousands of miles away from us in a positive way."

The concert will feature several acts, headlined by local band The Rigbys, and the fair will include activities for children, including storytelling and puppeteers, Jeanes said.

But the real focus of the fair, he said, will be its Fair Trade Village, which will feature vendors and representatives of local organizations that promote and/or engage in free trade and equal exchange practices.

The village also will have an informational station for each of the eight Millennium Development Goals.

Admission to the fair is free, but donations will be accepted.

The eight U.N. development goals, adopted in 2000, target hunger, disease, poverty and basic human rights, and were designed to cut extreme poverty in half by 2015.

Seven years have passed since their adoption, and most people still don't even know about the goals, said Mary Abrams, chairwoman of the B.E.A.T. event.

Approximately half the world's population lives on less than $2 a day, and more than 30,000 children under the age of 5 die every day from easily treatable diseases like malaria and diarrhea, she said.

"We are the first generation that have the ability to eradicate extreme poverty, and those goals are so important. We are halfway through and we are not halfway there, I don't believe," she said. "If everybody did a little bit, we could eradicate extreme poverty."

That's what is motivating the church to hold what it hopes will be the first of an annual tradition, Jeanes said.

"We are doing this to raise awareness and support, to address world poverty…To raise awareness and support to beat world poverty."

QUICK TAKE

Name: St. James Episcopal Church

Address: 401 La Grange Road in Pewee Valley

Services: Sunday Eucharist, 8, 9:15 and 11 a.m.; Sunday school, 10:15 a.m.; during the school year from September to May, Wednesday Eucharist, 5:30 p.m., followed by dinner at 6 p.m. and formation programs for youths and adults from 6:30-7:15 p.m.

Congregation: 300

Phone: 241-8136

Web site: www.stjamespewee.org