April 12, 2010. Evansville Courier & Press.
About 1,000 members of Tri-State congregations will speak with one voice next week when they press decision-makers to improve local public transportation and affordable housing.
Congregations Acting for Justice and Empowerment, popularly known as CAJE, will meet April 22 at St. Benedict Cathedral, 1328 Lincoln Ave. The meeting begins at 7 p.m. but participants are urged to arrive early.
Established in 2004, CAJE is made up of 14 congregations who represent Catholic, Protestant, Unitarian Universalist and Jewish faiths. The group focuses on social justice issues and hosts an annual action meeting at which it asks local leaders to commit resources toward those issues.
CAJE’s current issues are public transportation and affordable housing.
The Rev. Joe Easley, pastor of Central United Methodist Church and a member of CAJE’s executive committee, said the congregations will ask for two specific things this year.
On the issue of affordable housing, Easley said, CAJE will ask the city of Evansville to commit money toward the city’s Housing Trust Fund, and to add to the fund regularly starting in 2012. At last year’s meeting, Mayor Jonathan Weinzapfel promised the city would contribute $500,000 to this fund both in 2010 and 2011. The money is to be used for housing for people living at or below 50 percent of median income.
Regarding public transportation, Easley said, CAJE will ask Vanderburgh County Commissioners and the Metropolitan Evansville Transportation System to add a new bus route that would go up U.S. 41 north to AmeriQual Foods.
CAJE’s way of working — involving congregations in the fight for social justice — is powerful for a couple of reasons, Easley said.
The setup gives people a way to participate in local government, he said, but it also has a spiritual component.
All the world’s major faiths are concerned with social justice, Easley said, and a group like CAJE “gives our congregations a way to express that.”
