Fasting raises hunger awareness

By Matthew Meyerhofer

Santa Clara students and faculty participated in a 24-hour hunger fast in support of Oxfam America's Fast for World Harvest this past Tuesday and Wednesday. The fast helped to raise money for the organization's fight against world hunger and allowed Santa Clara students to express their solidarity with those living in hunger.

"The more informed we are, the more loving we can be. And the more compassionate we can be, the more we can accomplish," Matthew Smith, a Resident Minister for the Unity Residential Learning Community, who helped to organize the fast, said. "It's through that loving, that compassion and that solidarity that we can accomplish a lot â€" not being imperialistic in our action, but walking with people."

Students had a chance to eat grilled cheese and tomato sandwiches and tomato soup Tuesday evening in the lounge of Walsh Residence Hall before beginning their fast.

After the meal, they had a chance to talk about the value of fasting in their expressions of solidarity.

"The hunger banquet is a great way to educate high school students and college students about world hunger and hunger in America," Lauren Wray said, the student leader of Santa Clarans for Social Justice, who helped organize the fast and banquet. "It's kind of a token way of being aware and remembering these things that we sometimes forget."

Students listened guest speaker to Fr. Louis Vitale talk about his own experiences fasting. Vitale is a Lecturer in Spirituality and Practice of Nonviolence at the Franciscan School of Theology, and Pastor of St. Boniface Church in San Francisco.

"Fasting is a way of checking the ego," Vitale explained, who sees fasting as having both a positive impact on the individual as well as a way of expressing solidarity and compassion.

"When I fast, I find that I'm energized after a period of time," he said.

Vitale said the principles fasting are a common in many major world religions as a practice of self-control and as means of creating mystical experience. He has participated in some fasts that lasted a month or longer, and cites Mahatma Ghandi and Cesar Chavez as two figures whose use of fasting he particularly admires.

"One of the major motivations for fasting is to be conscious of the fact that there are people who don't have a choice in the matter," Vitale said. "It's good for us, but I also like that aspect of being aware that we are very privileged to have the choice of whether to fast or not to fast. It's a way of nonviolently expressing what you're concerned about."

Students who participate in the fast generally donate the money they otherwise would have spent on food for the day to Oxfam, to help that organization's fight against hunger. This is the ninth time Santa Clara has sponsored the event.

The fast was organized by Santa Clarans for Social Justice, who chose to hold it at the beginning of Lent rather than during its traditional time during the Thanksgiving holiday. This was so it would coincide with Human Dignity Week, which ran from Feb. 25 through March 3.

"We have found in the past and now that this is a great way of educating people," Wray said. "It's very inclusive, it's an intense learning experience, and everyone leaves with a far better understanding â€" it's a striking experience."

SCSJ is a student organization affiliated with Campus Ministry that brings attention to social justice issues in an attempt to educate and motivate students.

"We try to educate ourselves and educate our peers about social justice issues in our country and in our world," Wray said.

Students and faculty broke the fast at the Oxfam Hunger Banquet on Wednesday at 7:00 p.m. in the Brass Rail. The banquet was designed in such a way as to raise awareness about hunger and help students sympathize with the conditions those living in third world countries often face.

"When you get there, you take an envelope, and inside the envelope is your identity for the night, upper, middle or lower class," Wray said. "The upper class gets a four-course meal served by waiters, the middle class gets a very basic meal of rice and beans and the poor class gets a pot of rice in the corner."

Additionally, participants had the chance to watch presentations and engage in discussions relating to world trade and poverty as well as hunger issues.

"It's hard because you come in and you're not really sure what's going on," Wray said. "It's an intense learning experience."

Oxfam America is an organization that fights hunger by raising awareness about hunger problems both at home and abroad. That organization aims to combat world hunger by working with local communities and organizations to correct the social, political and economic problems that contribute to the problem.

Oxfam America estimates that there are 840 million people worldwide living in hunger, 31 million of which are living in the United States.

"We really believe in Oxfam," Smith said. "Oxfam is an organization that doesn't just work for temporary change, they try to get down to the root problems."

û Contact Matthew Meyerhofer at (408) 554-4546 or mmeyerhofer@scu.edu.