This Week

Ho, everyone who thirsts, 
come to the waters; 
you that have no money, 
come, buy, and eat! 
Come, buy wine and milk 
without money and without price.  
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, 
and your labor for that which does not satisfy? 
Listen carefully to me, and eat
what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.  
Incline your ear, and come to me; 
listen, so you may live.  
I will make with you an 
everlasting covenant, 
my steadfast, sure love for David.
----Isaiah 55:1-3

Hope is the primary prophetic idiom not because of 
the general dynamic of history or because of the 
signs of the times but because the prophet speaks 
to a people who, willy-nilly, are God's people.  
Hope is what this community must do because it is 
God's community invited to be in God's pilgrimage...
The hope-filled language of prophecy, in cutting 
through the royal despair and hopelessness, 
is the language of amazement.  It is a language that 
engages the community in new discernments and 
celebration just when it had nearly given up 
and had nothing to celebrate.  
----Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination

On the night of October 26, 2000, Minnesota's 188 shelters 
and transitional housing programs were providing a 
temporary place to stay for 7,121 homeless men, women, 
unaccompanied youth, and children. An additional 
51 homeless people were staying in detox facilities. 
Using conservative estimates based on studies done 
elsewhere of the harder-to-find homeless, 
another 1,424 people were staying in places not meant 
for human habitation (such as in cars, under bridges, 
and in abandoned buildings), and another 12,733 were 
"doubling up" temporarily with family or friends.
 
The total estimated number of people homeless or 
precariously housed in Minnesota on this night, 
or any other recent night, is 21,329.
In nine years the proportion of homeless adults 
working full- or part-time has more than doubled 
from 19 percent in 1991 to 41 percent in 2000. 
The proportion working full-time has more than 
tripled from 7.5 percent to 26 percent. Over one-quarter 
of all homeless adults now report their main source 
of income is from steady employment. However, 
68 percent earn less than $10 an hour, and 
39 percent earn less than $8 an hour. To afford 
an average one-bedroom apartment in the Twin Cities 
area ($664 in 2000) would require an hourly wage 
of about $12.70.  		
---- Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, www.wilder.org

We are the dead
ones the slow
fast suicides
of our time.
we are the dis 
enfranchised ones 
the buyers of bread 
one day removed 
from mold 
we are maimed 
in our posture
---- Sonia Sanchez  "Old Words"

Ramon: This is not a life. We Dead. The main problem with 
the homeless people-it's not missing a home, not missing 
food-the loneliness, that's the one.
John: I don't get welfare. Whatever I got on 
the street is mine.  Nobody's going to say nothing. 
Nobody's giving me nothing. I may be one of the few 
that are doing it. I stay here. I go to work every day...
I'm on the street making money, collecting the cans. 
I don't beg...If I don't make it today, I'll make 
it tomorrow or the next day.	
---- Margaret Morton, quoting the underground homeless in The Tunnel

 
I am the one whose praise 
echoes on high.
I adorn all the earth.
I am the breeze 
that nurtures all things green.
I encourage blossoms to flourish with ripening fruits.
I am led by the spirit to feed 
the purest streams.
I am the rain
coming from the dew
that causes the grasses to laugh
with the joy of life.
I call forth tears,
the aroma of holy work.
I am the yearning for good.
----Hildegard of Bingen, 
Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen