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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Saturday, July 26, 2003

Anti-poverty cyclists span U.S.

• O'ahu event to be Aug. 2

By Bill Broadway
Washington Post

In a small Missouri town southeast of Kansas City, cyclist Brenda Rascher was pursued by four rottweilers, a Doberman and a Great Dane. One of the rottweilers knocked her off the bike and bit her leg and arm before its owners ran from their house to pull him off.

Four days later, after a trip to the emergency room and recuperation in a support vehicle, Rascher rejoined 23 riders on a cross-country bike tour designed to call attention to the plight of 33 million Americans living in poverty.

"The whole purpose of being here is the cause, not my individual riding," said Rascher, 46, an attorney for a nonprofit social services agency in Camden, N.J.

The thought of quitting "crossed my mind, but I guess I'm too stubborn" not to complete the tour, she said last week en route to Coldwater, Mich.

The Brake the Cycle of Poverty tour, which began June 1, is a challenging two-month trip from San Francisco to Washington. The cyclists were in Detroit recently and were making their way across Ohio, Pennsylvania and Maryland. Their goal is to complete the tour Friday at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops headquarters in Washington.

The trip was organized by the bishops' Catholic Campaign for Human Development, which supports anti-poverty programs nationwide. When they complete their 3,880-mile journey, the volunteer riders will have traveled through 34 Catholic dioceses in 12 states and made dozens of presentations on poverty in parish halls and community centers.

The point of the tour is "awareness-raising," not fund raising, said the Rev. Robert Vitillo, the campaign's executive director.

Mary Wright, education coordinator for the campaign and an avid cyclist, called the 61-day marathon her "crazy idea." But the mission effort has exceeded her expectations and drawn attention to America's poor in a way airplane trips to many places never had, she said this week from Gary, Ind.

"Much of my job is flying into a city, doing a presentation and flying out," said Wright, 57. "You learn more about the country by bicycling through it. And there's a lot more awareness if there's a gang of us."

In virtually every city and town they've passed through, at stop lights or in Dairy Queens or coffee shops, people have asked where the group is from and what the cyclists are up to, they said.

"It's amazing to see people's expressions when they hear we are riding across the country," said Kevin Graves, 20, of Silver Spring, Md., the youngest among the riders, whose ages range up to 73. "But the best thing is to see their faces when they hear what we're riding for."

In presentations and conversations, riders tell how a 2003 Catholic Campaign survey indicates most people believe that 5 million or fewer Americans live in poverty — defined by the campaign as a family of four with a household income less than $18,000 — when the actual figure is six times as large. The goal is to get people to "know the numbers" but also to realize that poverty exists in virtually every town in the country, riders said.

Rascher said a Colorado parishioner told them during a session, "There's no poverty here." A fellow church member — a woman the parishioner sees every week — responded, "What are you talking about? I live below the poverty guidelines."

Graves, who will be a sophomore at Virginia's Lynchburg College this fall, decided to spend his summer this way because he has "always loved biking" and "wanted to do something for poverty and, as a Catholic, wanted to change something, to help out."

Participants came from different parts of the country, and all but staff members Wright and Lee Anne Adams paid their own expenses, typically more than $1,000 for airfare to San Francisco and back home from Washington. Most meals — and energy bars and other athletic snacks — are being provided by parishes that host the group along the way.

Wright said she has been heartened by the willingness of people to help out. When one rider took a tumble and damaged her bike, Wright said, a bike shop owner came in on a Sunday — his day off — to make the repairs.

"That's the kind of generosity we've seen across the U.S.," she said.

On the Web:

For the itinerary of the Brake the Cycle of Poverty tour, along with rider biographies and a daily journal: www.usccb.org/cchd

• • •

O'ahu event to be Aug. 2

 •  Brake the Cycle of Poverty

O'ahu solidarity event

8:30 a.m. next Saturday

263-8844 ext. 302

The Diocese of Honolulu will host a solidarity event next Saturday in connection with the nationwide Brake the Cycle of Poverty bike tour.

On O'ahu, riders will leave at 8:30 a.m. next Saturday from the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace and make stops at four parishes: Co-Cathedral of St. Theresa, St. John the Baptist, Holy Family and St. Philomena churches.

Mini-rallies will be held at each church. Organizers are encouraging people to donate loose change and canned goods during those mini-rallies.

Iwie Tamashiro, coordinator of the O'ahu activities, expects riders to reach St. Philomena at about 10:30 a.m. They'll gather at the church for a prayer service and lunch with others.

As of Thursday, 15 riders had signed up, "but we keep getting calls every day," Tamashiro said.

It was intended to be a relay, with riders from one parish riding only to the next church, but some want to do the entire route, she said.

"What's been really wonderful is we've had several families call," she said. "It's a matter of keeping everybody in the line and on their bikes and with their helmets on."

One priest is committed to ride from St. Theresa's to St. John the Baptist.

"We were trying to get (another priest) to take the ride over the hill to St. Philomena, but that's not going to happen," Tamashiro said with a laugh.

— Mary Kaye Ritz, Advertiser religion writer