In the Dominican Republic, an estimated 10 percent of children are sexually exploited. According to Project Rescue, the average age around the world for a child sex slave is 13, and the average cost for a child sex slave is $150.

But child sexual exploitation is not only an overseas issue. According to U.S. law enforcement, there are at least 20,000 children manipulated and forced to engage in prostitution on a daily basis -- the actual number is unknown. What is known is that child sexual violence and exploitation has been growing dramatically around the world for the past couple of decades.

Advances in technology and communication have served to exacerbate the problem. But contrary to popular opinion, child pornography is not confined to seedy Web sites. Mainstream Web sites, such as Craig's List, allow for "barely legal" adult offers.

In the U.S., the high demand and easy money is a lure for vulnerable children. In 2005, The New York Times told Justin Berry's story. At 13 years old, Justin entered a life he eventually realized he would not be able to leave without significant intervention. Thankfully, he did obtain the help he needed. But his story exemplifies the evolution and ease of child exploitation in a high-tech world. The article stated,

A six-month investigation into this corner of the Internet found that such sites had emerged largely without attracting the attention of law enforcement or youth protection organizations …. "We've been aware of the use of the Webcam and its potential use by exploiters," said Ernest E. Allen, chief executive of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, a private group. "But this is a variation on a theme that we haven't seen. It's unbelievable."

Of course, child exploitation goes beyond Internet pornography. After a series of investigations in the early '90s, the FBI stated:

the utilization of computer telecommunications was rapidly becoming one of the most prevalent techniques by which some sex offenders shared pornographic images of minors and identified and recruited children into sexually illicit relationships. In 1995, based on information developed during this investigation, the Innocent Images National Initiative was started .…

The PBS program Now recently discussed child prostitution in the U.S. with Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin, who said:

It's one of those issues that doesn't get discussed and therefore there's an assumption that perhaps either it doesn't exist at all or the young women and girls who are prostitutes are there by their own free will … [The child prostitutes are] 10 or 11 years old, and the age is getting lower. We're not talking about 17 and 18 and 19-year-olds, although we could.

My friend Rev. Gabriel Salguero reminds us of the need for all of us to use our gifts to combat child exploitation. We must respond to the issue as a community where writers, musicians, politicians, business people, and the religious community use our collective resources to raise one voice to protect the children of our world. He challenges us not to see this issue in terms of nationality or geography but as an issue that calls into question our very sense of humanity.

Rev. Juan Carlos Morales is the senior pastor of Hosanna Assemblies of God in Ellenville, New York. He is also a member of the Latino Leadership Circle, a graduate of the Center for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME), and a seminarian at New Brunswick Theological Seminary. On Thursday, May 29, the Inocencia Project raised monies in its first public event and fundraiser. Inocencia Project was founded by Emanuel Veras to combat child prostitution in the Dominican Republic and around the world. Inocencia Project is a project of Cigua Palmera Foundation and is supported by Hiccup Media Group and through individual donations. To donate and learn more about Inocencia Project, go to www.ciguapalmera.org.

For more information about efforts to address this critical need, go to:

www.projectrescue.com
www.libertadlatina.org/cd/Site/organizationalpages/OC5b_childprostitution.htm
www.pbs.org/now/shows/422/index.html
www.fbi.gov/page2/dec05/innocence_lost_arrest3.htm
www.humantrafficking.org/countries/united_states_of_america

I don’t want to assume that readers automatically know who Steven Curtis Chapman is, but if you’ve been surfing the Web recently, it’s very likely you may have seen the name. Chapman is one of the most visible and influential figures of the Christian music genre. As of 2007, he has sold more than 10 million albums, has nine gold and platinum albums, and won five Grammy awards.

Chapman and his wife, Mary Beth, have six children – three biological and three adopted young girls from China. On Wednesday, May 21, the Chapman family received the worst of news.  In what was meant to be a celebratory week for the Chapman family, their youngest daughter – 5-year-old Maria Sue Chapman – was killed in a tragic car accident. 

“Just hours before, this close-knit family was celebrating the engagement of the oldest daughter, Emily Chapman, and [was] just hours away from a graduation party marking Caleb Chapman’s completion of high school. Now, they are preparing to bury a child who blew out five candles on a birthday cake less than 10 days ago ..." said Jim Houser, Chapman's manager.

As a parent of three myself, my heart absolutely aches and mourns for Steven and Mary Beth and their entire family.  What makes this story more gut-wrenching was that their daughter was accidentally struck and killed in their driveway by an SUV driven by their younger teenage son. Tragic.

I’ve been surprised at how Maria Sue’s death has impacted so many. I figured a handful of Christian news sources would cover the story, but it’s been very widespread and still remains one of the top items on search engines. The last time I checked, 18,301 well wishes, blessings, condolences, and prayers were left on a tribute blog titled, “In Memory of Maria.”  Perhaps it speaks to the many ways Chapman has ministered to so many people through his music.  Or perhaps it speaks to how Steven and Mary Beth have demonstrated the beauty of the gospel through their lives – not just through his music but their advocacy for adoption through Shaohannah's Hope, “a charity organization which offers grants to qualifying families to help defray the cost of adopting, at home and abroad,” along with numerous other expressions of justice and compassion.

No parent ever wants to be in the news because of a tragedy, but nevertheless, it is good that so many have been drawn to the Chapman family story and the loss of their child.  While we lift them in prayer and celebrate Maria’s life and the hope that is found in the gospel of Christ, let’s not stop there. 

Be mindful of the millions -- especially children -- whose lives are as precious in the eyes of God.  As a result of Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar and an idiotic military junta government, at least 80,000 have perished with about 56,000 still missing.  About 2 to 3 million people are homeless.  Relief groups estimate that at least one-third of the perished are children.  Do not forget them.

Be mindful of millions impacted by the earthquake in Sichuan, China, where, as of this morning, these were the “statistics:" 67,183 confirmed dead, 361,722 injured, 20,790 missing, and approximately 5 million people homeless.  About 5,000 children have been orphaned. Do not forget them.

According to UNICEF, 27,000 to 30,000 children die each day due to the complexities of global poverty.  It is true that last year UNICEF reported worldwide child deaths at a record low: 9.7 million per year.  For the first time in modern history, the number of children dying before age 5 fell below 10 million per year.  But that’s still 9.7 million children. 

Let that sink in … deep.  And do not forget them.

I grieve, mourn, and hope with the Chapman family. I’ve found myself randomly crying for their family -- even while I am convicted of the great hope of the gospel of Christ.  But it’s also my hope that the outpouring of care and compassion for the loss of their child also compels each of us to be more HUMAN.  By this, I am simply suggesting that we live as God intended -- to care not only for ourselves [our kind, our nations, our families, and our children] but for the many -- locally and globally -- that need the compassion and kindness of fellow humans.

Let’s not just be in love with the idea of compassion and justice.  Let’s do our part to change the world.

Eugene Cho, a second generation Korean-American, is the founder and lead pastor of Quest Church in Seattle, Washington, and the executive director of Q Cafe, an innovative nonprofit neighborhood café in the city with only a handful of cafés. You can stalk him at his blog at: eugenecho.wordpress.com.

Joy and I woke up yesterday morning at 5:00 a.m. to the sounds of our screaming four-year-old, Jack, who was suffering from extreme abdominal pain. We tried to console and cuddle him, but to no avail. "Don't touch me, it really hurts!" he cried, when we tried to examine or gently rub his sore tummy. This was not like him at all; he is not an overreactive kid. We had to go get him at school that day because he was vomiting and had diarrhea. He had a quiet afternoon at home and went to sleep easily, but now was literally wailing and inconsolable.

It's every parent's greatest fear - a sick child, maybe very sick, and in the middle of the night. How serious might it be? Could it be appendicitis - or something equally bad? This wasn't like Jack. Then nine-year-old Luke, who had been awakened by Jack's crying, was in our room too - tired, scared, and also crying. What should we do? I called our health provider and got a nurse advisor. After I described Jack's symptoms and distress, she said, "Take him to the emergency room at Children's Hospital." So we threw clothes on and rushed out to the garage. There was snow on the ground and ice on the steps as I carried my screaming and scared little boy. "Why didn't I put on boots with a grip?" I asked myself, as I carefully but hurriedly climbed down the treacherous steps with Jack in my arms.

We got in the car and headed into the deserted Washington, D.C. streets on our way to an emergency room we hoped and prayed was not too busy. Joy drove with Luke, who was asking all kinds of worried questions, while I tried to calm Jack (and myself) in the back seat by praying out loud that God would keep him safe. Luke joined in the prayers. We arrived at the ER, and I rushed in with Jack while Joy and Luke went to park the car.

It's the moment of panicked parenthood, rushing into the emergency room with your suffering and frightened child, almost frantically surveying the room for where you should go. "He's got severe abdominal pains; we need to see a doctor now!" I almost shout to the first person I encounter. I am in no mood to fill out papers and forms and talk about insurance coverage as I slap Jack's insurance card on the reception desk.

Fortunately, we are quickly accepted and admitted. They are all very attentive, compassionate, and professional. From the intake personnel, to the nurses, to the doctors (we were lucky enough to get the head of the ER who was on his shift just them), everybody was clearly competent and concerned. Joy and Luke rushed in soon after we did and we were all taken to a clean and quiet room where Jack was quickly and comprehensively examined. They spoke reassuringly as they looked at our little boy, telling us what they were going to do and what the possibilities were. Right away they got an IV to hydrate him and administer some pain-reducing medicine that was gentle for children. He got quieter and seemed to relax.

I saw a hospital system focus on a little boy with time, energy, concern, and (I assume) lots of financial resources. They did several X-rays of his stomach, chest, and lungs, and even did a comprehensive ultrasound to look for any sign of an inflamed appendix. The medicine was working its wonders and Jack was getting sleepy. But I had to wake him up, sit, and stand him up for the X-rays. My little trooper was a star as he stood still the best he could, even after such a traumatic morning, waiting for the technician to "take a picture of your tummy," as I told him. He looked up at me with such vulnerable and trusting eyes and said, "Even if my tummy can't smile." Afterward, I knew he was becoming himself again when he began to make several observations about the environment around him and philosophized, "When you're sad, and they turn you upside down, it turns into a smile." Yes, I said, amazed at how perspective does indeed change everything.

Joy was running Luke to school now, as Jack and I moved around the hospital for all the tests, in what we began to call his "traveling bed," which he thought was quite cool. Jack's big brother Luke was really worried and kept pressing his mom on whether Jack was okay and "wasn't going to die, right?" She assured him that his little brother was in very good hands now and would be alright. "Without Jack, life would be nothing," Luke tearfully lamented. "The first four years of my life were really boring!" he exclaimed to his moved and bemused mother.

She was back now in the hospital after dropping Luke off at school. Jack was resting comfortably back in our safe little room in the ER, and the doctor came in to tell us the results of all the testing, X-rays, and diagnosis. "Your son has pneumonia," he said, shocking us both. A nagging cough had settled into his left lung and was making him vomit while putting very painful pressure on his diaphragm and abdomen. But they were going to start administering the antibiotic right then and there, and, with a couple days of rest and quiet, he would start to get better. And there was no sign of appendicitis.

Several hours after our frightful awakening, we got Jack home and I got the antibiotic that was so critical to his healing at our health care provider's pharmacy. It was $10. And all the other care my son had received that morning was already paid for by our insurance. Jack was home, comfortable, and safe; while his mom and dad were greatly relieved. After Luke borrowed his fourth grade teacher's cell phone to call home to see how Jack was, he was finally relieved too.

But I began to think how different this all would have been if we were a family who didn't have health insurance and therefore hesitated or were afraid to go to the emergency room. Or, if we were "undocumented" and were terrified to take our child to a hospital. Or, if we were parents in Uganda living hundreds of miles from a doctor and just had to listen to our screaming child and hope that he wouldn't die.

My policy views on health care reform are very public. But this morning made it all very personal. Every parent, no matter who they are and where they live, can easily have the kind of trauma over the health of a child that we had. And every parent should have the medical care that we got. It's just wrong if they don't. What I realized most was how important it is for those who have that care to fight for those who don't. Other parents love their children just as fiercely as we love Jack, pray just as fervently for their healing, and have the right - as absolutely equally important children of God - to good and affordable health care. God loves all the children as much as God loves Jack, and its time to build a health care system in this country that respects that fundamental moral affirmation.

Two months ago, for the first time in my eight years living in Washington, D.C., I was mugged. Two young men rolled up in a pickup truck while I was unloading groceries from my car in the alley next to my condo building. They made me lie on the ground, held a gun to my neck as they took my money, and then locked me in the trunk of my car as they made their getaway. Fortunately I still had my cell phone in my pocket and was able to call 911 from the trunk. The police were able to free me, as well as pursue and arrest two suspects who are now in the District court system.

I was not hurt, they took little of real value, and I feel like I've done a pretty good job of refusing to let fear change the way I live. Fairly or unfairly, with my privileged status, I'm not worried about my future or my survival. I am worried about those two young men, and many others like them. What influences, role models, or lack of positive options allowed them to make such stupid and destructive choices?

In reflecting on my mugging, I've only recently begun to connect a few dots. For the past six years, I've been on the board of Urban Family Development (UFD), a nonprofit organization that currently runs programs for after school enrichment, tutoring, and mentoring - and we have lots of big dreams for expansion. However, it's always been a struggle to find funding and volunteers for this kind of work with such a great need, many worthy ministries, and a limited pool people willing to sacrifice their time or money.

I don't know what the government of D.C. is going to spend to prosecute and potentially imprison those muggers, but I'm pretty sure it would be enough to give UFD a solid financial boost - and then some. The most visible anti-crime measures in my neighborhood consist of portable floodlights rotated around sketchy street corners. A church friend who once interned at UFD and is now a D.C. policeman confirms what a band-aid these strategies are, even as he tries to do his job with integrity. Instead of high-visibility, low-impact band-aids, I want UFD to provide better options for as many youth as possible, so that fewer young men and women grow up to make stupid choices like wrecking their lives to steal my $20. I want to execute a preemptive strike on this kind of stupidity by supporting a program that provides a safe place for children, gives them mentors through the difficult years of adolescence, and then celebrates their success - all of which UFD does.

Why can't we - both as a society and as a church - do better at providing positive choices for our youth? And for me it is a both/and. I've seen more small-government conservatives willing roll up their sleeves and volunteer as tutors. Meanwhile, it's mostly the justice-minded liberals who march and lobby to end poverty and violence. How can we get more liberals to show up at UFD and more conservatives to advocate? (I know these categories are unfair and far from universal, but I've seen this dynamic over and over in my own church experience.)

Government at every level must do better at making the needed resources available, if for no other reason that the churches simply don't have the resources to do it all on their own. But the church must also be the conscience of the state - challenging not only with words, but by example in serving and caring for those at the margins of society. Conversely, the words of the prophet Jeremiah may inspire the church, but they were originally spoken to a king: "Did not your father eat and drink and do justice and righteousness? Then it was well with him. He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Is not this to know me? says the Lord." (Jeremiah 22:15b-16)

Consider this as the onslaught of opportunities for "Canned Compassion" wash over us with the holiday season, and look for opportunities to do both justice and mercy, not with band-aids of a march here or a meal there, but with sustained service and activism that seeks real healing for our communities.

Ryan Rodrick Beiler is web editor for Sojourners.

There is a good deal of contention about President George W. Bush's reasons for vetoing the SCHIP legislation that would have provided a much needed expansion of medical coverage for America's poorest children. Bush's supporters assert that the legislation would extend coverage to middle class families with incomes up to $83,000 a year, while hundreds of thousands of poor children would remain uninsured. They also share his argument that the bill would be a major step toward "socialized" medicine and government-run health care.

Those who opposed Bush's veto, including several prominent members of his own party, dismiss these reasons as specious and disingenuous. Senator Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, calls Bush's claims "flatly incorrect." Republican Senator Orrin G. Hatch contends that rather than covering "rich" children, upwards of 92 percent of the children covered will be from families with incomes less than 200 percent of the poverty level – less than $41,300 for a family of four. Bush's opponents also contend that his stated concern that expanding medical coverage for poor children will result in government-run healthcare makes little sense, especially since there have been government-run healthcare programs for Americans for decades – namely, Medicare and Medicaid – yet America is no closer to becoming a socialist state than it has ever been.

If the reasons President Bush has given for his veto are not his real reasons, what might those real reasons be? Read the full entry »

Mamta, a winsome, wide-eyed girl of 12 moves through her daily chores in a poor household in India. Although still a child, her life has little play, and she will too soon be bearing the full responsibilities and burdens of an adult woman: Mamta was married at the age of 7. At puberty she will quit school and move to the house of her husband, who she's had no contact with since her wedding night five years ago.

You can meet Mamta in a special hour-long broadcast tonight of the PBS weekly newsmagazine NOW. In Child Brides: Stolen Lives, NOW senior correspondent Maria Hinojosa takes viewers to Guatemala, India, and Niger to explore stories of early marriages and to show how people are campaigning to end child marriage in many of these communities - sometimes at the risk of their own lives.

On a trip to Ethiopia last year, I saw firsthand the devastating ripple effects of child marriage on individuals and on an impoverished country. Millions of girls around the world are forced into marriages long before they are grown. They are usually deprived of schooling, virtually powerless when the husband or his family is abusive, at high risk for HIV/AIDS infection from their older, sexually experienced husbands, and face disability or death for themselves and their babies when they become pregnant before their bodies are ready.

The NOW broadcast is a great opportunity to learn more about child marriage and why it's so important to stand up on behalf of these children and support community-based efforts to end this practice. Child marriage legislation is currently before the U.S. Congress - to learn more, visit the International Center for Research on Women Web site.

Julie Polter is an associate editor of Sojourners.

As expected, President Bush yesterday vetoed legislation that would expand the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).

At our religious leaders' news conference on Tuesday, I spoke of the issues at stake here.

Jesus made healing a principal sign of his ministry and of the presence of the kingdom of God. From a biblical point of view, it is simply wrong when health becomes a commodity and accessibility depends upon wealth. Until something is done to make universal health care a reality in America, millions of families will remain poor. SCHIP is one bill – one program – to help fix the health care problem. No bill is perfect. But a bipartisan group of legislators think it is a good bill in the right direction.

To veto the bill, with no alternative plan instead - to simply abandon millions of poor children, to leave them to a market system that is failing to provide health care to enough people - is simply morally unacceptable. We must not allow this to become an ideological battle over the larger issue of health care systems. This is about a specific program for poor children that a bipartisan majority believes is working. This is not about health care theories - this is about children. And now, overriding a presidential veto will become the next faith-based issue.

Also speaking to the media were the heads of two denominations who also serve on our Sojourners Board. Sharon Watkins, general minister and president of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) said:

Mr. President, members of the House and Senate, 9 million American children are without health care coverage this day. Those children are our children. God has given them into our care. We are the responsible adults who say whether they see a doctor or not. Our hearts need to break for them because they are our own. They are our future, and we need to give them a bright future. When historians reflect back on this era, do we want to be remembered as the people who turned their backs on the uninsured children of this nation?

And Glenn R. Palmberg, President of the Evangelical Covenant Church added:

An earlier administration, some 20 years ago, tried to declare ketchup a vegetable in the children's school lunch program. It was seen as a cruel and cynical response to the plight of low-income children. I still hear that talked about as the legacy of that administration regarding poor children some 20 years later. I think this veto has the potential of being talked about 20 years from now as part of the legacy of this administration, and it is seen as a cruel and cynical response to the needs of poor children.

As the Congress now gears up for the veto override battle, I commend the words of Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), one of the primary sponsors:

I disagree with the [White House] legislative staff on all of this. Frankly, I think the president has had pretty poor advice on this. I can answer every objection that they've made, and I'm very favorable to the president. I know he's compassionate. I know he's concerned about these kids, but he's been sold a bill of goods.

This article also appeared today at Time.com

When I first heard that President Bush was vowing to veto a bipartisan bill to expand child healthcare, my immediate thought was more personal than political. What has happened to him?, I wondered. Now that he has followed through on his threat, I can't help but think about the first time we met and the conversation we had about children.

Just one day after Bush secured his election in December 2000, I received a phone call inviting me to Austin to meet with him and a small group of religious leaders. The president-elect wanted to discuss his oft-stated passion for really tackling the persistent problem of poverty and to tell us about his vision for "faith-based initiatives." I had not voted for George W. Bush, and that fact was no secret to him or his staff. But he reached out to me, and to others in the faith community across the political spectrum, because we shared a common concern. I was impressed by that, and by the topic of gathering down in Austin.

Those of us who had been summoned to Texas filed into a little Sunday School classroom at First Baptist, Austin, where we would meet with Bush. I had preached at the church before and knew the pastor, who told me how puzzled he was that his quite "progressive" church was chosen for the meeting. Inside the classroom, twenty-five of us were seated in chairs, chatting and not knowing what to expect, when Bush walked in without any great introduction. He took a seat and told us that he just wanted to listen to our concerns, to hear what we thought the solutions were for dealing with poverty in America.

And he really did listen, more than presidents often do. He also asked questions. One sounded lofty, yet it resonated with those of us seated around the room: "How do I speak to the soul of America?" My answer to that was simple: Focus on the children. Their plight is our shame, I told him, and their promise is our future. Reach them and you reach our soul. Bush nodded in agreement. The conversation was rich and deep for more than an hour and a half.

When the discussion officially ended, Bush moved around the room, talking with us individually or in small groups for another hour. I could see that his staff was anxious to whisk him away (cabinet appointments were being made that week and there were key departments yet to fill). Yet he lingered and continued to ask questions. At one point, he turned to me and said, with what I could only read as complete sincerity, "Jim, I don't understand poor people. I've never lived with poor people or been around poor people much. I don't understand what they think and feel about a lot of things. I'm just a white Republican guy who doesn't get it. How do I get it?"

I still recall the intense and earnest look on his face as he stared right into my eyes and asked his question. It was a moment of humility and candor that, frankly, we don't often see with Presidents.

My response to President-elect Bush was borne of my own experience. He should, I suggested, listen to poor people themselves, and pay attention to those who live and work with the poor. Again, he nodded his head; again, he seemed to agree. When I returned home, I told my wife Joy, also a clergyperson, about our conversation. Weeks later, we listened together to President Bush's first inaugural address. When he said, "America, at its best, is compassionate. In the quiet of American conscience, we know that deep, persistent poverty is unworthy of our nation's promise. And whatever our views of its cause, we can agree that children at risk are not at fault….Many in our country do not know the pain of poverty, but we can listen to those who do," my wife poked me in the ribs and smiled.

Bush talked more about poverty in that inaugural address than any president had for a long time. When I said so in a newspaper column soon after, my Democratic friends were not pleased. Nor did they like the fact that I started attending meetings at the White House with the President and members of his staff about how to best construct a "faith-based initiative." Other friends of mine, however, were appointed to lead and staff the new Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, the first the White House had ever seen. We brought many delegations of religious leaders—conservative, liberal, and everything in-between—to meet with the men and women who ran that office. Many of us dared hope that something new might be in the air.

But that was a long time ago. We don't hear much about that office or initiative anymore. Most of my friends have long left. I don't hear about meetings now. The phrase "compassionate conservatism" rarely passes the lips of anyone at the White House these days.

And now, the President has vetoed a bipartisan measure to expand health insurance for low-income children. Most of his expressed objections to the bill have been vigorously refuted by Republican Senators who helped craft the legislation. Members of his own party have vowed to lobby their colleagues in an effort to override the veto. During his first presidential campaign, Bush chided conservative House Republicans for spending cuts accomplished on the backs of the poor. Now congressional Republicans are chiding him.

What happened to this president? The money needed for expanding health care to poor children in America is far less than the money that has been lost and wasted on corruption in Iraq. How have the priorities strayed so far from those children, whom he once agreed were so central to the soul of the nation? What do they need to do to get the President's attention again?

The faithful—of all creeds and political affiliations—barraged the White House last week, imploring the President to reconsider his veto threat. Our efforts did not bear fruit. But I wonder if, before he put his veto stamp on that legislation, the President thought back to that little meeting in a Baptist Sunday school classroom, not far from where he grew up. I wonder if he remembered that day, what we talked about, what was on his heart, and how much hope there was in the room.

If he knows his Bible, the President should remember that Jesus said to suffer the little children. This, however, isn't exactly what he meant.

Yesterday Jim stood with a group of religious leaders to challenge President Bush's promised veto of a bill to expand health coverage for children. He told some of the story of Bush's early days in office that he told here last week, asking what happened to his "compassionate" conservatism, and asking why Bush would veto a bill with broad bipartisan support, abandoning America's children to a failing system. Bush's veto, which came this morning at 10 a.m., is morally unacceptable, and overriding it will be our next "faith-based initiative."

Over the weekend, conservative Republican leaders began to "spin" President Bush's expected veto of children's heath insurance (SCHIP). They said it would cover children in families with incomes up to $83,000 per year. A Washington Post op-ed points out that "up to" is a slippery phrase. The Urban Institute estimates that 70 percent of children covered would come from families with incomes less than $41,300, and most of the rest from families earning less than $62,000 - not a luxurious income for a family of four in places with high costs of living. They said it would take children off private health insurance and move then to "government-run" health care. Wrong again. About two thirds of the approximately 10 million children who would be covered now have no health insurance whatsoever. And, the SCHIP program is a government-financed program, not a government-run program.

What the conservatives fail to answer, and what never will be answered on Fox News, is what do you do when the market has failed to provide health care for almost 50 million Americans, and those who oppose covering the kids now have literally no alternative plan in mind? Their alternative—leave millions of children without health insurance. That is immoral. Bill Gates, the richest and likely best capitalist in the world, has no trouble admitting the "market failures" in the world of health care, so why can't the conservative Republicans? It is indeed about the children. My open letter to President Bush last Thursday still stands, and I ask once more: Mr. President, remember the poor children you used to talk about at the beginning of your administration. Let this bill pass or offer us a better plan.

In his Saturday radio address, The Washington Post reports that

President Bush again called Democrats "irresponsible" for pushing an expansion he opposes to a children's health insurance program. "Democrats in Congress have decided to pass a bill they know will be vetoed," Bush said of the measure.

So, one may wonder, just who are these irresponsible Democrats who are pushing the expansion of SCHIP?

"This legislation will get the Children's Health Insurance Program back on track and reclaim precious resources for low-income kids," said Sen. Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa.

Another Republican, Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, R-Utah, called the agreement "an honest compromise that improves a program that works for America's low-income children." Asked whether he would vote to override a veto, Sen. Hatch, a staunch conservative, said, "You bet your sweet bippy I will."

"I am proud to support this important bill, which will provide health insurance coverage to approximately 4 million more children who would otherwise be uninsured. I'm glad my colleagues and I were able to put politics aside and do what is right for these children," said Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kans.

"I'm very, very disappointed," said Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore. "I'm going to be voting for it."

"I am so pleased that the Senate has passed legislation to extend and strengthen this important program. Our bill, which passed with strong bipartisan support, increases funding for SCHIP by $35 billion over the next five years, a level which is sufficient to maintain coverage for all 6.6 million children currently enrolled, and also allows the program to expand to cover an additional 3.3 million low-income children," said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine.

There is strong bipartisan support for expanding the children's health insurance program in the Congress. But President Bush promises to veto this vital program for children's health. So, who is being irresponsible?

Our voices are being heard! Yesterday the House passed a bill to enlarge the State Children’s Health Insurance Program by $47 billion over five years to extend coverage to an additional 5 million children.

The Senate will be debating a similar measure to expand the highly successful program by $35 billion over five years, adding 3 million children. Despite President Bush’s ideologically-driven and mean-spirited threat of a veto, we are approaching a veto-proof majority of 70 votes in the Senate. In order to secure 70 votes we need a continuous barrage of phone calls from faith advocates from across the country adding their voices to a growing chorus that calls for a healthier future for our nation’s most vulnerable and disadvantaged children.

Call your senators today at (877) 367-5235, a free number set up by our friends at PICO National Network. Tell them that people of faith are counting on them to stand up for the millions of uninsured children in the U.S.

Adam Taylor is director of campaigns and organizing for Sojourners/Call to Renewal.