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Chapter 6 Highlights
- How much does a human life cost? $728.86. That’s the average annual amount it would take to stop the preventable death of a child under five, using available low-cost solutions. The total cost to help 6.9 million such children around the globe is estimated to be $5 billion a year.
- How much does the church in the U.S. have to apply to this need? Church members could have donated an additional $152 billion in 2002 by increasing their giving to a congregation-wide average of 10 percent. About 3% of this additional giving could have helped, in Jesus’ name, stop the most readily preventable 6.9 million annual child deaths around the world.
- What does this disparity mean? The lack of mobilization of additional giving to address this need is a crime against humanity, a crime of infanticide by omission, even though it is a crime of omission rather than commission.
- What does this disparity mean? The lack of mobilization of additional giving to address this need is a crime against humanity, a crime of infanticide by omission, even though it is a crime of omission rather than commission.
- Why is there no general mobilization of church member giving to address this need? Most church members in the U.S. are more committed to the practice of idolatry than to trustworthy obedience to their faith.
- Why is there no creative leadership to challenge church members to change? Church leaders have other agendas than doing the hard work of discipling church members to increase missions giving.
- Are there signs of hope? The signs of hope that exist, such as the breakthrough of The Episcopal Church with its “0.7% solution,” are mixed with controversy and problems. Yet, a church in South Korea that gives more than 60% of its budget to missions demonstrates what could be possible.