This article was written by Martha Loer, community advocate and  volunteer,
for iACT’s Doing Good Together column in the Austin-American Statesman.

I have been asked often what my passion is. Through my life experiences, I have realized that the answer is this:  I want to help end hunger.

As I grew up, I never experienced hunger and, as far as I knew, our little town had no hungry people. Now, I know that there are hidden hungry folks everywhere and huge numbers of people around the world who do not have enough to eat. How can we not respond?

As a younger adult, many of my activities revolved around our church and related organizations. I headed up Faith Food Pantry and, as a result of that, was asked to work with a small group to organize a food bank. From that tiny beginning, Capital Area Food Bank grew, now serving nearly 300 agencies in 21 counties!

I started working with CROP Hunger Walks over 30 years ago to help raise money, not only to feed the hungry, but to help them become self-sufficient. The money may fund a water well in an impoverished country that will allow people more time to grow their food because they no longer spend hours walking every day just to get water.

Participating in CROP has revealed another passion – I want to get to know people. Many of us have no friends or acquaintances of another race or another religion. The CROP Hunger Walks have been my opportunity to meet people who are not all just like me. The annual walks have helped me grow and see more opportunities to serve others?

Now, I purposely seek out people of other races and religions. I began attending iACT’s Red Bench Interfaith Conversations once a month. During these evenings, important topics are discussed around tables of people from different places with different ways of thinking. Everyone comes with an attitude of acceptance, regardless of what difference there may be in their beliefs.

There is no substitute for your long-time, loved and faithful friends, but you can certainly expand your list of people you care about and know. And, there is something to be said for widening your point of view.

People say we should, “Get out of our comfort zone,” but I say, “Enlarge your comfort zone!”  My life is richer since I mingle with all kinds of people. CROP Hunger Walks and iACT Red Bench evenings are two of my favorite things.