In a world where celebrities are known to embrace humanitarian causes when in need of an image rehab, it is easy to be cynical. Rock stars or movie stars peddling charity for some personal sympathy — who hasn't heard that one before?

So last week, when Bono came to Dallas, I thought about skipping a reception at which he was expected to mingle with some locals before delivering a speech to a sold-out crowd. Part of my trepidation was being crowded into a room packed with star-struck fans clamoring for a photograph. And worse, a person's public image hardly ever matches with reality, and I was afraid my admiration for this humanitarian rock star would take a hit.

Still, I attended. With only about 50 of us at the reception, I even got to ask the Nobel Peace Prize nominee about our current immigration debate. I found him disarming and charming, but, more important, he seemed genuinely engaged.

Immigration, however, wasn't what brought him to Dallas. On his mind, always it seems, is Africa and her poverty.

Considering that a recent survey found that most young adults can't even locate Iraq on a map, it would be easy to ignore what's happening in Africa — so far away, not our problem.

But it is. And that's a message Bono has been spreading for years. Why should blessed countries like ours be burdened? Simple — national security. After all, it was former Secretary of State Colin Powell who said, "The war against terror is bound up in the war against poverty."

"In turbulent times, isn't it cheaper to make friends out of potential enemies than to defend yourself against them later?" Bono asked. "A better world happens to be a safer one, as well."

And he's not talking we-are-the-world bleeding-heart speak. He offers practical solutions that involve all of us that could eradicate poverty in our lifetime. And why shouldn't it be true that "where you live in the world should not determine whether you live," as Bono put it?

He has been able to win support from some unlikely allies, who might have said before that corruption in African governments makes it impossible to help. Bono urges accountability for both the recipient and the donor. It doesn't hurt that Bono, who grew up with a Catholic mother and Protestant father, preaches about higher laws and quotes Scripture in reminding us of our social responsibility to the poor. In the end, he says, it's not about charity but about justice.

A Bono mentor, Jeffrey D. Sachs, writes in "The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time" that the United States spent about $450 billion on the military last year, compared to about $15 billion — about 15 cents on every $100 of U.S. gross national product — fighting poverty.

Every month, some 150,000 Africans die, too often from treatable diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis, in some cases because they lack access to medicines easily available here. Or because they lack anti-malarial bed nets or safe drinking water or because their starving bodies can't fight off disease. In some villages, the only ones left are grandmothers and orphans of the AIDS epidemic.

Across the globe, poverty kills some 8 million people every year.

These stories hardly make the front page — human life reduced to harsh statistics.

Given his global audience, perhaps Bono is spreading his message better than any world leader could.

Macarena Hernandez is a Dallas Morning News editorial columnist.