Observing a Weekend of Prayer and Action against Hunger on 16-17 October 2021, the World Council of Churches and a range of ecumenical organizations and partners invite people and churches around the globe to pray and act for an end to hunger.
Across the globe more than 41 million girls, boys, women and men – around half of them children – are at risk of starvation across 43 countries. This is happening in a context where 811 million people worldwide go to bed hungry each night and hunger increased globally by 25% in 2020.
Behind the situation is a set of converging crises, including conflict, the impacts of climate change, and COVID-19’s devastating economic impacts, adding to the deep injustices the pandemic has revealed and exacerbated.
Observing a Weekend of Prayer and Action against Hunger on 16-17 October 2021, the World Council of Churches and a range of ecumenical organizations and partners now invite people and churches around the globe to pray and act for an end to hunger.
A variety of resources ranging from liturgical material and fact sheets to social media assets for sharing across networks have been made available to aid communities in both prayer and action.
The Ten Commandments of Food proposed by World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit and formulated with the input from the WCC- Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance’s strategy group guiding the Food for Life campaign. By distilling the key principles, the Ten Commandments of Food address the existential challenge of hunger and inequity in this world in an innovative and spiritually engaging way:
- Give thanks for the food you eat.
- Eat food grown as close as possible to where you live.
- Strive for all people to have knowledge about and access to affordable, nutritious food.
- Eat mindfully and in moderation.
- Do not waste food.
- Be grateful to those who grow and prepare food for your table.
- Support fair wages for farmworkers, farmers and food workers.
- Reduce the environmental damage of land, water and air from food production and the food system.
- Protect the biodiversity of seeds, soils, ecosystems and the cultures of food producers.
- Rejoice and share the sacred gift of food with all.
