Light a Lamp

On November 8, we will light the lamps of Diwali. In the weeks that follow, tables across Central Texas will fill with the foods and traditions we love. Sweets will pass from home to home. Gurdwaras will welcome neighbors to langar on Guru Nanak Jayanti. Families will fry latkes for Hanukkah, wrap tamales for Las Posadas, gather for Christmas dinner and share the Karamu feast during Kwanzaa.

Through my interfaith work in Austin, I have come to treasure these invitations. We pray differently. We tell different stories. Yet again and again, I hear the same call: feed the hungry, welcome the stranger, care for your neighbor.

This year, I want us to make room for one more child.

In the Dharmic tradition I draw from, annadana, the gift of food, is among the highest forms of giving. Atithi devo bhava asks us to receive the guest as God. Vasudhaiva kutumbakam reminds us that the world is one family. If that is true, a child in a classroom across town belongs to my family too.

Other traditions echo it. Jewish teaching calls us to pursue justice through tzedakah. Jesus identifies himself with the hungry and asks his followers to feed them. Islamic teaching calls us to care for a hungry neighbor. Kwanzaa’s principle of ujamaa calls us to build and sustain community together.

Nearly two million Texas children, about one in four, face food insecurity, according to Feeding America’s latest estimates. These are children in our schools. Their parents may be working and still struggling to cover groceries after rent and utilities. A teacher or school counselor may notice the need long before the rest of us do.

I founded CooperationEngine to connect people who need care with people who want to help. Often, the willingness is already there. What is missing is a trusted connection.

This Diwali, we are launching Light a Lamp, an invitation to make that connection for our children.

The idea is simple. A trusted teacher or counselor identifies a need: meals for the weekend, school supplies, a winter coat. Through a local nonprofit serving that campus, a congregation, business or neighbor can help meet it. The family’s identity stays private, and no child is singled out. A child should never have to carry shame along with hunger.

We are building this work around three commitments. Gifts for children go to the local nonprofit serving their campus; CooperationEngine takes no share. Businesses and congregations can support the platform’s costs separately. And we will publish the count of lamps lit so our community can see the work taking shape.

Picture a Hindu business owner, a Baptist congregation and a Jewish youth group helping children at the same school. Each has answered the same call to care.

We invite churches, Hindu temples, synagogues, Buddhist temples, masjids and all faith organizations to join us, along with businesses and anyone moved to help. Whether you bring forward a need through a trusted school or nonprofit partner, or contribute to a request someone has shared, there is a place for you.

We are also inviting nonprofits, school districts and communities already serving children to join us in Laulima for Kids. Laulima is a Hawaiian word meaning “many hands.” That is how we will accomplish this: each of us bringing what we can.

We will kindle this lamp at Diwali and carry its light through Christmas and the new year. Then we will keep tending it until our vision for 2030 is accomplished: no child in Central Texas going hungry or feeling ashamed to ask for a meal. That is a large hope. It asks something of all of us, including me.

A lamp loses nothing by lighting another. I believe unconditional care is possible. Our faith gives us reasons to practice it, and our neighbors give us the opportunity.

This season of giving, let’s make room for one more child at the table, and keep that place open.

Come light a lamp with us at cooperationengine.com/light-a-lamp.