Today the purveyors of good works, the environment and the arts are rightly concerned about the eagerness of Congress to cut them down. The telephones are ringing off the hook and the mail is filled with cries of distress.

I’ve supported the arts, civil rights, the planet, and the helpless for most of my life. But now, in the face of total destruction, the need has grown and my income has not.

How many good works can a retiree afford to support before the "fixed" income changes to "broke" under the load? I picture the needy causes in the Scriptural image of the sparrows. You know; "...not one of them shall fall...not one is forgotten before God."

Well, maybe the Deity can afford it. Each year at tax time I am astonished at how many sparrows are in the air because of my small checks. I don't have Divine resources so, year after year, I call myself cutting down the list of donations.

Still the letters come. I'm sure we are all on every mailing list. This burden has to be part of the Postal Service's problems.

How do you select for the cut? Well, I deleted several organizations because they seemed to have lots of funds without me. Dr. Jacques Cousteau has to be making a bundle out of those television specials.

I automatically cut organizations which dun me under two or three misspellings of my name, or which bill me after I've sent my donation. Group management should be at least as smart as I am.

I want to continue to reside on Planet Earth, and figure it needs all the help we can give, but no one can afford all the Whole Earth organizations.

I've chosen groups on the barricades of environmental concern which, though they appear to be small, are taking direct action. The League of Conservation Voters, for example, reports to me on what legislators are voting for or against. That is where the story is; not in political speeches.

Renew America analyzes community and state programs and then provides its members with an annual report. In addition, it accords national recognition to areas with especially good actions to their credit.

In fact, the Bishopville-St. Martin's Neck Community Association in Worcester County received a Special Merit Award in Growth Management for "Environmental Success in Land Stewardship." That was before the County's recent set-back, you should excuse the expression.

Some of my help goes to folks who look after me, personally: senior citizen activist groups, my old labor union, women's rights organizations, and vital local institutions such as the paramedics, fire fighters, and the Fraternal Order of Police.

That doesn't include my church and the professional groups of which I'm a dues- paying member.

Obviously, something has to give, despite the Congressional threats. One or two of those Scriptural sparrows will have to land on somebody else's checkbook.

Meanwhile, come winter, I'll give their earthly brethren in my yard some more seed and cracked corn. Will that count?