And it may be that this coming week we will have more good news. We've been working hard through our Seven Hills Homeless Center to build a needed transitional housing facility for working women and families and for the disabled. We have a grants and gifts of over a half million dollars, and this week we hope to get approval of a location for that facility.

This Sunday we conclude our twice-a-year Community Kids Closet campaign to get good clothes for elementary aged children who need them. All of these ministries serve some of the poorest children in our area and their parents. I'm proud of the positive impact this church has on some of the most vexing challenges in our region. Health, clothing and shelter. We've stepped up to make a difference.

I'm also proud of what we have for children within our own congregation. Last year we hired Jane Gober to be St. Paul's first full time minister for Children and Families. She's expanding the outstanding ministries of nurture and formation that we have for our youngest members. I love our Montessori styled Christian Education program. These kids are learning the faith experientially. It's powerful stuff.

And our fine children's music program under Charlie Rigsby and the returning Linda Kelly stimulates the development of children's brains and spirits profoundly, while planting the fruitful traditions of worship and praise deep within them. With your continued support, we've got some exciting plans to expand our music offerings to the very youngest and smallest children, hopefully in the coming year.

I hope you feel as good as I do about these kinds of things, and I hope you will be realistic about their costs and continue and your generous investment in St. Paul's through your active participation in our work and through your pledges and financial gifts. Thanks to you, we make a difference.

Despite all of this good news, one doesn't have to look very far to see some bad news as well. In August the U.S. Census Bureau reported that the Arkansas poverty rate which has been rising for the last four years is now the highest in the United States. Again median income dropped. One in five little ones, children under five years old, lives in poverty in our state. The number of poor children in Arkansas doubles the entire population of Fayetteville. A child in Arkansas dies before his or her first birthday every day. Pre-natal care is lacking. A child or teen in Arkansas is killed by gunfire every week.

But the news is not all bad. Thanks to the expanding accessibility of ARKids 1st, the percentage of poor children without health insurance dropped two full percentage points in 2003. Their parents haven't fared so well, as the number of uninsured adults has grown rather starkly. But one more bright sign of hope. Arkansas authorized $40 million for pre-kindergarten classes for at-risk three and four year olds, care and education for children at the time when they learn the fastest.

Improvements like these don't happen in a vacuum. They are the result of vision, hope and perseverance. I'm glad that this gospel about the persevering widow happens to be our reading for this year's Children's Sabbath.

It's the story of a widow who is in a threatening situation. All by herself, with no man to represent he in court, she is trying to exercise her rights. At issue is probably one of two things. Either she is entitled to maintenance from the resources of her late husband's estate or she is trying to regain control of property that she brought into the marriage.

Judges in first century Israel were usually appointed by the ruling elite and they exercised their office with a under the influence of bribes and inducements from the conflicting parties. It was an openly corrupt system, and this judge is described as a particularly arbitrary. He's denying her access to court, stalling, in violation of the Torah. Why? Maybe he's not satisfied with the what the adversaries are offering him. Maybe they know they can wait her out because of her slim resources. She is a woman out of place. They know her vulnerability. She should be an easy victim.

What does this woman do? She knows the odds are stacked against her. She adopts the same strategy as her opponents. She directs her appeal bluntly to the judge. She doesn't appeal to his honor or compassion or idealism. She just demands that he do his duty. And she does it openly, unlike her silent adversaries working behind closed doors. She goes public in a noisy way calculated to be embarrassing. One woman's voice continually crying for justice. She won't shut up. She won't go away.

The judge cries, "She will wear me out with her continual bruising." He uses a boxing term. Her pugnaciousness is like continual boxing blows that produce a black eye. Eventually it is easier to silence her by giving her what is due to her. Her perseverance in the face of immense odds is victorious.

We need women like that fighting for the children. That's what groups like the Children's Defense Fund and the Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families are all about. And sometimes, it can feel discouraging. The odds seem stacked against them. Children don't vote. They aren't rich and powerful. And they don't appear to be our nation's cultural priority.

Among industrialized nations, the U.S. ranks 1st in military technology, 1st in military exports, 1st in Gross Domestic Product, 1st in the number millionaires and billionaires, 1st in health technology, and 1st in defense expenditures. But, among industrialized nations, we are 12th in living standards among the poorest one-fifth of children, 13th in the gap between rich and poor children, 14th in efforts to lift children out of poverty, 16th in low-birthweight rates, 18th in the percent of children in poverty, 23rd in infant mortality, and last in protecting our children against gun violence.

Sometimes it feels like complaining about this failure of our corporate will is impossible and futile. I know that there are those who will be offended at my using the pulpit to do so. Good people disagree about what is the best strategy to overcome the ills that beset the poorest and most vulnerable children in our society. But I wish we could agree to make the children our highest corporate priority and be as tenacious and persevering as that annoying widow.

She's a biblical symbol for us. She is a reminder not to lose heart. She is an example of tough willingness to see reality in all of its complexity and ugliness. God needs tough people. She does not retreat to naive ideals but she demands what is right. She refuses to participate in her own victimization. She is a noisy woman. God bless noisy women.

God bless the Community Clinic at St. Francis House and Seven Hills. God bless our children growing up here within the care and love of this parish. God bless the poor children near and far and their struggling parents. God bless the children who have no parents to struggle for them. God bless those who give their lives to nurture, protect, teach and care for children. God bless the advocacy groups who try to wear down our system with their continual bruising. And God bless us that we may live into the image that brings light to our most holy space. May we, like Jesus, suffer the little children to come into wholeness, and forbid them not, for to such belongs the Kingdom of God.