CWS staff Leslie Wilson and Andrew Gifford at the 2015 Erie County CROP Hunger Walk. Photo: courtesy Andrew Gifford
The chance to walk last week’s 40th anniversary Erie County CROP Hunger Walk with 600 fellow Pennsylvanians was a great privilege for me and my two sisters who were able to join me from Rochester, NY and Chicago, IL. The 5.5 mile walk along the shores of Lake Erie on a sunny, cool fall day was inspiring, and I was honored to say a few words to all the walker teams who gathered briefly before head starters took their pace-setting first steps.
Greetings and thanks shared from our Asia colleagues and community and family partners with loyal volunteers and fundraisers from Northwest Pennsylvania energized us all, especially since I was able to highlight the core of our work – to alleviate hunger in the near-term and eliminate it in the longer term. To hear this fall’s Walk leader, Rev. Jim Haas , talk about the great progress that has been made in the global fight against acute hunger was encouraging, and to note the statistics on how far we yet have to travel was also inspiring.
The ecumenical nature of the Walk was also great to experience, and it reminded me of one of the best aspects of CWS. As a Roman Catholic myself, I appreciated being One in the Spirit with so many others for a good cause.
CWS is truly blessed to count on the indefatigable support of tens of thousands of CROP walkers every fall and spring, and I felt especially blessed to be part of such a wonderfully and repeatedly successful CROP Hunger Walk!
Leslie Wilson is CWS’s Regional Coordinator for Asia.