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National Observance of Children's Sabbaths^® Manual:
A Multi-Faith Resource for Year-Round Child Advocacy

This manual serves as a guide for you and your faith community to engage in child and family advocacy work through a National Observance of Children's Sabbaths Celebration and year-round. The manual includes resources for worship services, education programs, direct service activities, and social justice initiatives for your congregation, organization or community.

When Will We Hear Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Call to End Poverty in America?
National Observance of Children's Sabbaths Manual, Vol. 17

This year's manual focuses on answering Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King's call to build and be the Blessed Community where all children can live out their God-given potential. In the last years of his life, Dr. King warned against the triple dangers of materialism, militarism, and racism, and called on us as a nation and as a people of faith to respond. Unfortunately, these evils are still evident today:

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• In our wealthy nation today, one in six children lives in poverty while the rich get richer and millionaires reap tax breaks they don't need.
• In our powerful nation, we still resort to guns and violence rather than the power of non-violence to solve problems in our homes, neighborhoods and among nations.
• In our nation, founded on the truth that all people have the right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, rampant racial and economic disparities in access to quality health care and education combined with zero tolerance laws that criminalize children at younger and younger ages put Black boys born in 2001 at a one in three and Latino boys born the same year at a one in six lifetime risk of being incarcerated.

Forty years after his death, Dr. King's clarion call still waits for our answer in word and deed. How we respond to these urgent national crises at the intersection of poverty and race will determine how much our children have to struggle to find and remain on their paths to living and thriving as individuals and members of our broader community.

This easy-to-use manual provides worship materials for Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Bahá'í, and other faith traditions, and resources for an interfaith gathering. It also offers bulletin inserts, ideas for hands-on service and advocacy efforts, guidance for strengthening your efforts for children throughout the year, and much more.

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