Planting Churches among the City's Poor - Volume 1

296 • P LANTING C HURCHES AMONG THE C ITY ’ S P OOR : V OLUME 1

d. Gal. 6.10 (ESV) – So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.

C. Growing sense of hopelessness, nihilism, and despair of America’s urban poor, (i.e., those who are disenfranchised, alienated, and voiceless)

1. Failed social projects for America’s poor

a. Civil Rights Movement

b. The Great Society

c. Trickle-Down Economics

d. No-Child-Left-Behind promises

2. Present-day stark examples of the gap between the haves and the have-nots: Hurricane Katrina

3. Breakdown of infrastructures, institutions

a. Housing and urban development

b. Health care and quality of life

c. Lack of investment: deteriorating neighborhoods

d. Broken public systems: education, medical care, political corruption, etc.

e. Deep, growing animosity between city and city hall: the LA riots

4. The urban family’s woes: shattered, broken, neglected, decaying

a. Alienation: husbands from wives, parents from children, families from neighbors, neighbors from community

b. 70% born out of wedlock

c. Vast majority of prison populations of America from urban poor communities