Recognizing Injustice

We are currently back in the southwest, exploring Phoenix, Arizona.  This trip is not more prospecting for our future venture, rather it is us taking the opportunity to walk alongside some Mennonite youth as they have a chance to experience service learning.  We are here with the Youth Venture program, and today was our first day of "working".  We helped out with the lunch shift of one of the local chapters of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.  The clientele was mostly homeless and transient adults, and our job was to help clear the tables when a person was finished with their meal.

My interest in working with homeless persons was sparked when as a youth, I was involved in Youth Venture as a participant, and spent time working at a food pantry and soup kitchen.  My interest took another huge step when I spent time with a program called Service Adventure (also through the Mennonite church) after high school.  I worked in a program in the public schools of Albuquerque that enrolled and tutored homeless or transient children who had fallen behind in their schooling.  That year solidified a passion for working for justice for the "least of these".  I've had various other experiences since these times, and in each moment, I'm amazed at the economic injustice which exists so readily in our world.

But I have to be honest when I say that I was a bit turned off by the experience I had today at St. Vincent's.  I felt like the large cafeteria had one purpose: to be a shelter where a person can eat a meal.  The end.  We were informed in our "training" that the interest is in getting people in-and-out.  While many of the people know each other, the meal time is not supposed to be community-building.  Places like SVdP absolutely have a place -- they serve hundreds of people a day.  I simply feel more attracted to serving a person's humanity vs. their biology.  It mirrors the question people often deal with when considering giving to charity -- should I give a little bit of money to lots of organizations, or all my money to one?  Places like SVdP aim to respond to everyone's physical needs.  My interest is in supplying a few persons needs, be they physical, emotional, or spiritual.

I appreciated my time working at Trinity House Catholic Worker in Albuquerque a couple years ago, where I often played hostess to persons on the one day per week when the house was open for breakfast, showers, and laundry.  Most weeks we only had 3 or 4 people come in, but having the chance to sit down with them and hear their stories made we want to come back, week after week.

This is the vision that we have:  intimate, deliberate, and sufficient.