The Drought We Don’t Know About

Thursday, November 2, A.D. 2006

The state of Nebraska has been experiencing a severe drought. But how much have we actually heard about this ongoing plight? The media has barely reported these drought conditions, even though they have been plaguing the state for seven years now. “Drought has stretched [Nebraska’s] already-limited resources. Ponds and streams dry up, our lakes are at record lows, and pasture is under incredible stress,” reports a United Church of Christ minister in the town of Chadron. In addition, fierce wildfires ripped through parts of the state this past summer, forcing many people to evacuate their homes and farms. They returned home to tens of thousands of acres of charred land.

Unfortunately, many people have already left their small Nebraska towns because the living conditions are just not suitable. The economic hardships and losses have proved too great to withstand. "Farms simply employ fewer people than they once did and therefore provide less economic activity in small towns," explained Roddy Dunkerson, conference minister for the Nebraska Conference of the United Church of Christ. "The drought has made that process worse."

Likewise, Disaster News Network reports that “Emotional stress and legal questions are the top two reasons people are calling the ‘Nebraska Rural Response Hotline’ created by Interchurch Ministries. Farmers are living so far on the financial edge that any weather condition - from drought to a localized tornado - can bring on a breaking point.” Ecumenical and interfaith organizations of this kind are precisely the kind of initiatives Week of Compassion often supports. We are in close touch with the Christian Church in Nebraska and have responded throughout this chronic drought to our churches, farmers, and families in need.

“Drought might ebb and flow but it is not going away,” said Nebraska native Karen Ott, a writer and farmer’s wife. "If things don't change for the better there's going to be an empty, fire-blackened strip running through Middle America from Texas to Canada," she writes. And yet, in the midst of these relentless drought conditions, Kenneth Moore, Disciples Regional Minister in Nebraska, expressed this to Week of Compassion staff: “Part of our effort is to raise consciousness about God's other children whose needs are so much greater than our own.” What a remarkable and profoundly compassionate statement.

Even so, let us not forget our sisters and brothers in Nebraska, confronting the daily drought of which so many of us are barely aware.

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