Helping the Homeless, Part Two

Stewardship is often defined as everything we do
after we say, “I believe.”
stew•ard•ship
Function: noun
1: the office, duties, and obligations of a steward
2: the conducting, supervising, or managing of something; especially: the careful and responsible management of something entrusted to one's care
• We are God’s; ALL of our being belongs to God, our bodies, minds, and spirits
• All of our time, talents, and treasures are from God, for God, and the property of God
• We make a living by what we get; we make a life by what we give.
— Winston Churchill
• No person was ever honored for what he received. Honor has been the reward for what he gave. — Calvin Coolidge

We are just passing through this world and are given and entrusted with Time, Talent, and Treasure to use for God’s glory and our good.

Last week my email box was flooded with emails about blizzards and frigid temperatures and people shoveling their cars out from under mountains of snow, and I couldn’t help but wonder about the homeless who live in their cars or worse in this type of weather. What does it say about us as a society that we spend hours upon hours shopping for gifts half of us don’t need or want, just because the media tells us to, while we let people sleep in cars and cardboard boxes and on city sidewalks?

Call me a Scrooge if you want—I don’t decorate or bake or go to Christmas parties, and this year I probably won’t even send out Christmas cards--but over 90,000 people are homeless in Los Angeles alone. One friend wrote of hundreds of people living in cardboard boxes along riverbanks in Colorado because the shelters are all full, in temperatures that dipped to 26 degrees below last week. These are families with men, women and children. Another mentioned seeing people sleeping in the streets in Philadelphia, a phenomenon that is repeated nightly in cities all across the nation.

Another friend was at her local Mental Health Association one afternoon dropping off an angel tree gift for their program. As she was walking in, the Executive Secretary looked distraught and had with her a young family, including a 3 year old and an infant. They did not fit the mental illness criteria for the agency's clientele, but she couldn't leave them out in the rain, which was turning into ice and snow. They had no place to go and were drenched to the bone and hungry. They’d been walking to each of the shelters which were all full due to an apartment complex fire and the weather.

The Red Cross only pays for two nights of temporary lodging. The fire victims and this family had already exhausted those benefits. The MHA was opening up again at 11PM that night to handle the overflow of the homeless, but because they are grossly understaffed they have to close the center at the normal time of 8PM and cannot open up again until 11PM for the warming center – a place simply for people to come in out of the cold and get dry and warm.

My friend got to talk to the father - he was alone and crying at the elevator when she was ready to leave. He said he did not know why God was not hearing his prayers. They went into an empty office and had a chat. She told him two years ago she would have been homeless too if it were not for the support of her family and friends. She told him she was unable to see the Providence that God did give to her because it was not what she had expected, but it was Providence all the same. She told him he should try to focus on what he does have – a beautiful wife and two beautiful children and that at that moment his family was warm, dry, being fed, and able to get some sleep. Although he was at an agency that normally does not help people in his situation, they were doing everything they could to help them.

He hugged my friend and they talked a bit more. He’d lost his job and his unemployment benefits had run out, even with the extension. He’d sold his car to pay the rent one month and had been looking for work every day by foot or the bus, if he had the money for the bus. They got evicted a week ago because he could not handle paying the full rent when he needed to start using the heat. He said he had to feed the kids. He’d never been in this situation before.

My friend offered to go in from 8-11PM that night as a volunteer so this family did not need to take their children back out into the cold wet night. The MHA set up cots in a conference room, with a television set and children's movies. They’d eaten four meals since they arrived, they were that hungry.

When two of the staff learned my friend had volunteered to come down, they volunteered to stay, off the clock, so she would not be alone...they had to come back at 11PM for the warming center shelter anyway. Staff tried to sleep but they ended up playing with the kids, etc. They got everyone showered, all their laundry done, well fed and offered some companionship and encouragement. The father went back out to look for work all afternoon and met a good owner at a pizza parlor - this great guy went out and got them formula, diapers, and gave them all free dinners - and not pizza - he made them up a very nice meal. He also offered to give the father consideration with the first opening he has, however, he just laid off four of his staff and that was why he was working there that night.

There are good people out there, struggling just as much as those who are homeless, but struggling to do the right thing all the same. As my friend was leaving the mother said she has never been this low before but realizes that it will get better because there is no way to go but up.

Therefore my friend and I ask you to pray for the following:

That this family, and all families in this type of situation find space in a shelter.
That the Lord provides the breadwinners of such families with jobs that pay enough to feed and house their families and keep them warm.
And that the comfortable people in our society finally wake up to the crisis this nation is in and join together to do something about it.

As I said yesterday, I had my post all written, then accidentally deleted it. By then an hour and a half had passed, and I was hungry. So I went to my refrigerator and just stood there, staring at all the food in it and being grateful that I had so many choices when there are so many who have none. Being grateful that I was in a warm and dry home of my own while the wind blew and the rain poured. I can’t even begin to imagine the desolation the homeless must feel.

I then went to Mass, to give thanks for all that I’ve been given, put a check for the church’s food pantry in the collection plate, and although I was not hungry, agreed to go to lunch with a friend simply because I could.

I wanted to do so being aware of the blessing that was, to be able to walk into a restaurant and order whatever I wanted. We sat there for hours, talking and catching up on our lives. We would have closed the place down, had it been a different type of establishment. But for those few hours we were dry and warm and full, unlike so many others in our country, and for that I was grateful.

I want to ask you here to take a moment and think about the blessings you’ve been given, and find a way to share those blessings in this time of hardship for so many. Find out where your local homeless shelters are, make a pot of soup or a casserole or a few dozen extra Christmas cookies and drop them off on your way out shopping or to that Christmas party or concert. Take the money you would spend on a gift that a friend or relative doesn’t want or need, and donate it to your local food pantry. Drop a few dollars into the can outside the store and offer the Salvation Army bellringer a warm hello and a smile. Don’t avoid eye contact and pretend he or she isn’t there. Dig those old Christmas trees and ornaments you don’t use any more out of the attic or basement and donate them to someplace that could use a little Christmas cheer.

Go through your closets and collect your old coats and hats and gloves and blankets and drop them off at the nearest church or distribution center. They’re everywhere, if you just look. Take your children’s old books and toys to a community shelter for the kids there to read and play with. Take some time out of your frenzied Christmas preparations to volunteer at a community shelter and give the regular workers a break from the exhaustion that comes from serving others. Remember the reason for the season.

There are so many ways to help, just using what we already have on hand. And don’t forget to pray. Prayer costs nothing, but goes a long, long way.

Time, talent, and treasure. There is power in numbers. If everyone who can afford to did just a little, think of how much nicer a Christmas it could be for all of us.