What is Home? Who are our Homeless Brothers & Sisters?

What is Home?

We all have a need to be sheltered. We need to be out of the extremes of the elements of cold and heat. We need the physical conditions for growth and health. To be sheltered too is to find and have a "home" - a place that is safe and whole, a place to rest and to grow. We know that houses are not always places of safety and shelter for their occupants (if there is violence or harm occurring under a roof).

"A home, in the truest sense of the word, is much more than four walls and a roof. Home is a place where human dignity is respected and each person is free to develop his or her potential. A real home, one that helps us thrive, is all of these things: a safe place, a nurturing place, a stable grounding point, and a source of identity." Ahlers, Julia and Michael Wilt. Christian Justice: Sharing God's Goodness. Saint Mary's Press, 1995.

Invite your group to create a depiction of home using art. Have paper, paint, markers, etc. available. Ask each individual to spend some time drawing an image of a house that depicts what home means to them. You might offer some questions to help them think artistically and symbolically:

• Is the structure safe and sound?
• Are the doors open or closed?
• Who/how many can fit at the table?

Divide your group into small groups and invite them to reflect on their depictions. Have them describe why they drew what they drew.

Who are our homeless brothers and sisters?

"Often homelessness is not caused by one factor alone but results from a series of events. Sometimes homelessness is also caused by concurrent unbearable conditions or situations. Therefore, many seemingly unrelated issues are actually interconnected: they weave a web from which escape can be difficult. The challenges can be overwhelming." The National Alliance to End Homelessness

This activity invites youth to immerse themselves in four different realities of homelessness, to research options for overcoming homelessness, and to engage the resources available to people who are homeless. Use the "Snapshots" exercise on pages 4 and 5 at Ushigh.pdf to invite your group to take a closer look at the realities of homelessness. When they have completed the immersion, research and contacts, help them process the activity.

• What were the particular circumstances that contributed to homelessness in each case?
• How did you feel?
• What did you learn
• Is this easy? Frightening? Frustrating?

View additional information on homelessness - see websites in the What, How, What Else? Section

You might consider inviting a homeless or formerly homeless person to come speak to the group about the realities of being homeless. The National Coalition for the Homeless has a Speakers' Bureau with resources and links to homeless and formerly homeless individuals who speak to groups about their experience. http://www.nationalhomeless.org

Scripture

Read together the account of Lazarus and the Rich Man

Luke 16:19-31

• What did the rich man seem to see, focus on, notice? (look for garments, fine linen, good food)
• What did he not see? (the poor man he needed to walk over to get to the garments, fine linen, good food)
• What did Lazarus long for? (scraps from the table)
• At the judgment, whose heart was judged more sound? What was wrong with the rich man's?

Rewrite this parable in a modern context:

• Who is the rich man today?
• Who is Lazarus today?
• Where are they?
• What is the scene?
• What happens?
• What are some possible responses?

Action and Reflection

Prepare the young people for a visit to a homeless shelter, PADS shelter in a parish, or other place of service in need of volunteers. Emphasize that the task of volunteering is about encountering and sharing ourselves with other people.

Reprint this quote found an article by Claude-Marie Barbour, "Seeking Justice and Shalom in the City," International Review of Mission,1984, 304. The mission-in-reverse approach teaches that the minister can and should learn from the people ministered to - including, and perhaps especially, from the poor and marginalized people. By taking these people seriously, by listening to them... personal relationships are developed, and the dignity of the people is enhanced. Such presence to people is seen as necessarily allowing them to be leaders in the relationship.

Prepare time for reflection on the experience at the shelter.

Discuss:

• Who did you meet? What were the peoples'/individuals' names?
• What did you discover of their stories?
• What did you learn from them? Or from your reflection on your experience now?
• Did you experience mission-in-reverse? Learning from those you came to give to?
• For what do you need to be thankful because of this encounter?
• What are some possible responses?
• How can we remember that when we give, we often receive? We are one and equal. The giver and the receiver change places, after all. We learn from one another.