Clergy Deliver Letter for a Moral Budget

 

Despite the snow, faith leaders representing community members across the state came together this week to deliver a letter - signed by over 120 clergy leaders -  to legislative leadership and the Governor, calling for a state budget that addresses the crisis of need in Connecticut, including a substantive modification of the fiscal guardrails that prioritizes working people and disrupts pattern of systemic racism and generational poverty. 

This letter represents a demand from our faith community for the Governor and legislative leaders to do what’s right by the Connecticut residents who are unable to thrive in our state without bold investment in the programs and services that lift up our communities and economy. 

“As a faith leader, when we consider a “moral budget,” in my congregation, we reflect on the budget we present to our congregation, which embodies our identity as followers of Christ and how we believe Jesus urges us to be His hands, hearts, and feet in our community and the world today,” said  Reverend Tracy Johnson Russell, Rector at St. Monica’s Episcopal Church in Hartford and  strategy team member for the Greater Hartford Interfaith Action Alliance (GHIAA).

“For too long the state’s fiscal roadblocks have diverted massive financial resources away from the general fund, out of reach of the legislature, out of reach of the governor, creating the fiscal crisis our people and communities now face,” said Reverend Josh Pawelek, minister of the Unitarian Universalist Society East in Manchester, a leader with the Greater Hartford Interfaith Action Alliance and Connecticut for All, “The roadblocks may be a profitable arrangement for wall street bondholders and the state’s wealthiest citizens, but they are slowly impoverishing the people of Connecticut and the institutions they rely on. We see it every day. It needs to end.”

“It has been brought to my attention that we have many healthcare professionals in our congregation and it has been expressed that many who are in this industry are working families being set up by legislators to become hurting families,” said Dr. David Michael Bailey, Co-Pastor of the First Cathedral of Bloomfield, “They cannot afford to live like a decent human being and these people are caretaking for individuals who cannot take care of themselves. These caretakers are put into a cesspool of inequities and are being unjustly robbed by budgetary restrictions.”