Poverty USA by CCHD

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Poverty USA by CCHD

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Poverty USA is an initiative of the Catholic Campaign for Human Development. Working on the margins. CCHD offers a hand up, not a hand out.

CCHD provides Catholics concrete opportunities to live out love of God and neighbor in ways that express our baptismal call and continuing Eucharistic transformation.

10/16/2026

What does poverty look like on paper?

The federal poverty threshold sets a single income line for households of every size: $19,985 for three people, $25,701 for four, up to $51,393 for nine or more. That income has to stretch across rent, groceries, gas, childcare, transportation, and medicine for an entire household, for an entire year.

Understanding how poverty is measured is the first step toward addressing it honestly. It is not a distant statistic. It is a math problem millions of families are solving every single month.

See the full breakdown of poverty thresholds: https://www.povertyusa.org/facts

10/14/2026

A lunch tray can change a child's whole day. 🍎

Free school lunch programs do more than fill a gap between breakfast and dinner. They reduce the stigma around needing a meal, improve the variety and quality of food in a student's diet (especially fresh fruits and vegetables), improve health and lower obesity rates, and raise attendance among low income, food insecure students.

Feeding a child is not charity in the smallest sense of the word. It is an investment in that child's ability to learn, grow, and thrive.

Learn more about the policies that protect food access: https://www.povertyusa.org/policies

10/12/2026

Peace requires justice.

If you want peace, work for justice, said Pope St. Paul VI.

It is tempting to mistake quiet for peace. But a neighborhood where families cannot make rent, where wages do not cover groceries, where no one in power returns a phone call, is not at peace. It is simply enduring.

Scripture describes something fuller: shalom, a peace built on right relationship. Fair pay. Safe housing. Honest work. A real voice in the decisions shaping your family's future.

That is the peace the Catholic Campaign for Human Development works toward, and it is built, not wished for.

Learn more about the work & donate: https://www.igivecatholic.org/story/USCCB-CCHD

10/09/2026

Poverty has an address. 📊

In 2019, Cook County, Illinois was home to 5,112,701 people, and 734,470 of them were living in poverty, a rate of 14.4%. That is a city's worth of neighbors living below the federal poverty threshold, in a single county.

Data like this exists for every county in the United States, including the one you live in. We publish it because a national average is easy to scroll past, and a neighbor is not.

Look up the numbers for your own county: https://www.povertyusa.org/data

10/07/2026

Struggling with mental health is common. More than half of Americans will be diagnosed with a mental illness at some point in their life. But for people living in poverty, it is far more common still.

People living in poverty account for only 11% of the U.S. population, yet nearly a quarter of people with depression. Unstable housing, food insecurity, and constant financial stress compound one another, and access to care is often out of reach for families who need it most.

CCHD supported groups like the Chicago Coalition to Save Our Mental Health Centers have spent thirty years expanding access to mental healthcare in underserved Chicago neighborhoods, opening community centers and winning the referendums that fund them.

Read the full story: https://www.povertyusa.org/mental-health-and-poverty

10/05/2026

God of light, give us the freedom to walk in the footprints of your Son, Jesus.

Let our light shine out for all to see by turning to those who call for our help.

Heal our wounds, heal our community. Amen. 🕊️

Hope, in Catholic social teaching, is never passive. It is a decision made on behalf of a neighbor and then carried out. That is the work CCHD supports every day: turning prayer into action for families living in poverty across the United States.

Learn more about this work: https://www.igivecatholic.org/story/USCCB-CCHD

10/02/2026

You have five minutes. That is all this takes.

We hear it often: people care about poverty in America but do not know where to start, or assume the fix requires more time than they have. It does not.

Reading one story, signing one petition, sharing one resource with your parish. Each takes less time than your coffee break, and each is a real step toward addressing the root causes of poverty rather than just its symptoms.

Learn more or take action today: https://www.povertyusa.org/act

09/30/2026

A new piece in Project Syndicate names something CCHD has believed for over fifty years: real development requires agency, not just aid.

Writing in Project Syndicate, Gordon Whitman of Faith in Action International argues that most global development fails for a simple reason: the people it is meant to help are treated as recipients, not decision makers. Seventy four percent of the world's population lives under authoritarian rule, and even in democracies, disengagement runs deep. His proposed fix is not another program. It is organizing.

Whitman points to the Catholic Campaign for Human Development as a model that already works: governing boards required to be majority low income, funding tied to the principle of subsidiarity, and more than fifty years of concrete victories, from higher wages to paid family leave to affordable housing.

As Pope Leo XIV put it, listening and dialogue are the common ground upon which to cultivate justice and fraternity. That has been CCHD's approach since 1969, and it is good to see it named as part of the answer for the whole world.

Read the full commentary from Project Syndicate: https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/global-development-crisis-of-agency-requires-grassroots-organizing-by-gordon-whitman-2026-09

09/29/2026

Congratulations to Ivonn Rivera on the continued success of Misas del Barrio. ⛪

Supported by our grant program and recognized with the Cardinal Bernardin New Leadership Award, Ivonn's outdoor pop up Masses are transforming her local neighborhood. By meeting people where they are, her work is strengthening community bonds and driving record attendance back to the parish.

This is what CCHD funding makes possible: not just programs, but people, empowered to lead where they are already trusted.

Read the full feature from National Catholic Reporter: https://www.ncronline.org/news/silicon-valley-pop-masses-bring-church-and-communities-together

09/25/2026

Take action.

Not everyone can write a check or sit on a committee. Nearly everyone can pass something on.

Share what you have learned about poverty in America with your parish, your family group text, your feed. It costs nothing and takes about ten seconds, and it is how movements find their next member.

"Go and do likewise." (Luke 10:37)

Share this with a friend.

Address

Washington D.C., DC

Website

http://www.povertyusa.org/

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