Bono: 'It's Not Charity, It's Justice'

Bono returns to his New York Times guest columnist spot a week after Easter with a spiritual meditation about the holiday and economics. The season of Lent is not just a time for individual reflection, opines the singer, but also for rethinking our social priorities. Of global projects like the fight against AIDS and malaria, he writes: “It’s not alms, it’s investment. It’s not charity, it’s justice.”

"Lent is upon us whether we asked for it or not,” he writes. “And with it, we hope, comes a chance at redemption. But redemption is not just a spiritual term, it’s an economic concept.” America has entered a moment of economic hardship, he warns, but in "the roughest of times, people show who they are. So much of the discussion today is about value, not values. Aid well spent can be an example of both, values and value for money.” (More Bono stories.)