Walkers working together to help end world’s hunger

Martha O’Gorman (left) and Cindy Dugan, co-chairwomen, make plans for the 2009 Sondra King Memorial CROP Hunger Walk. Registration begins at 2 p.m. Sunday for the 3 p.m. walk, which starts and ends at Westminster Presbyterian Church, 830 N. Annie Glidden Road, DeKalb. (Provided photo.)

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“We walk because they walk!” Walking in solidarity with the poor, participants in the 2009 Sondra King Memorial CROP Hunger Walk will step off at 3 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 18 from Westminster Presbyterian Church, 830 Annie Glidden Road in DeKalb.

Participants will walk the 4-mile walk (or the one Golden Mile walk), knowing that poor people all over the world must walk long distances to get food, water, medical help and supplies. 

They will walk hoping to raise $30,000 to help end hunger in DeKalb and throughout the world.

Twenty-five percent of the money collected by the walk stays in the community, with funds going to Hope Haven, Meals On Wheels, some local food pantries and Safe Passage.  The rest goes to the aid and development projects of Church World Service.

Registration begins at 2 p.m. at Westminster Presbyterian Church. Bread and Roses Women’s Chorus, DeKalb Mayor Kris Povlsen and Sycamore Mayor Ken Mundy will be there for the gala send-off. 

Walkers collecting $100 or more will be given souvenir water bottles. The Walk will end with supper and a celebration at the same church.

After being started by Midwesterners – then called the Christian Rural Overseas Program, to aid Europe after World War II – this fundraiser was in its early years a way for farmers to send actual crops abroad. The effort in 1969 was converted to a walk fundraiser, and is called by many as the “grandfather” of all such walks. CROP Hunger Walk is the only communitywide fundraiser to end hunger. CWS is a cooperative ministry of 36 Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican denominations.  It sponsors sustainable self-help and development, disaster relief programs in more than 80 countries. 

For more information call co-chairwomen Martha O’Gorman at 815-761-4280 or Cindy Dugan at 815-758-1563.