Homelessness Immersion

From February 8 to 9, a group of youth from Fourth Church Rising participated in a homelessness immersion experience that we organized in cooperation with the Interfaith Council for the Homeless. "In cooperation" is actually probably being too generous about our end of the deal, because ICH really did the heavy lifting in terms of putting this all together. Big thanks to Bill Johnson, Mark Wendorff, and the staff at ICH!

The idea behind this event was to give our youth an opportunity to experience and learn what homelessness in Chicago is all about. We asked our youth and adults not to eat after lunch on Friday and plan to fast until dinner on Saturday. We modeled this on the 30 Hour Famine and even collected some money for ICH.

We began by gathering at Fourth Church and then hopped on a CTA bus and El train to make our way to the PADS shelter at First United Church of Oak Park, which was not in use that night. We arrived and engaged in an incredible discussion about the realities and root causes of homelessness.

After this conversation, we were ushered out into the parking lot to experience what it's like to be checked into a shelter. After waiting outside in the cold and snow, we were all checked in and picked pads to sleep on for the night.

We were awakened early Saturday morning and forced to leave the shelter at 7:30. We hopped back on the Green Line and headed into the city, getting off on Kedzie and walking up to Sanctuary Place, ICH's residence for women and families who have transitioned out of homelessness.

We were immediately thrown into another immersion experience, participating in a "game" that simulated what it is like to attempt to obtain documentation and services as a homeless person. This was a fascinating exercise that left many of us frustrated. We all learned how difficult it is to obtain these services when you lack resources.

After processing this simulation, we prepared lunch for some of the residents at Sanctuary Place, which was painful because we still weren't eating. Over lunch, we had moving conversations with women who were formerly homeless but who are now working on stabilizing their lives and the lives of their families.

After this we had some free time for homework or hanging out, which was followed by two great speakers from the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless. One of these speakers, currently a college student, was homeless for most of his teen years. It was powerful to hear his story of teen homelessness and how he managed to escape it.

After doing some cleaning projects for Sanctuary Place, we rode the bus back to Fourth's neighborhood and broke our fast with more pizza than we could eat.

In all, this was an amazing, powerful, and transforming experience. We learned a lot about homelessness and thought a lot about what we can do to help. We distinguished between the concepts of charity and justice and thought about ways we can do both. We'll continue this conversation for years to come as we think about this persistent problem in our society and world.

Check out this link for some pictures from the weekend.