I Used To Work The Streets: How Jesus Would Run The Homeless Off Without Helping.
A couple years ago, I signed up for an ambulance shift that covered the Christmas concert going on at the LDS Conference center.
It was bougie, so much nicer than sitting in an ambulance for 12 hours “roving” the streets and then waiting in empty parking lots for a 911 call that comes through the radio from dispatch.
They (Missionaries? People running the event? I am not sure.) fed us dinner along with other Police personnel, Fire Chief, Temple Square Sister Missionaries, and many older couples in dress and tie. I don’t know them, but they smile at me as
After dinner, I am escorted to the press room where my partner and I wait to be summoned by a man in a tie and an earpiece in his ear, to whatever emergency may happen in the building.
We got calls to the parking area and then to the nurses room on the first floor. One of our patients didn’t want to go to the hospital by ambulance, so we escorted her to her car with her mom to see them safely off as they made their way to the hospital by themselves.
As we headed out the doors, I was struck by how empty it was outside the conference area. People experiencing homelessness are all over Salt Lake City. They look for any overhang or safe shelter to set up camp or get a break from the weather.
I ask the security guard that accompanied us outside.
“Do you make sure there aren’t any homeless people on church property?”
“Yes, we do.”
“That’s a bit ironic.”
No comment.
I get it, the people who have settled in the city without a home are 90% chance on drugs and 90% chance carrying a weapon, usually a homemade knife of some sort, and most usually for their own safety. I know from personal experience after personal experience.
But what struck me more than anything was that most all other shelters in Salt Lake City are run by other Christian Churches. Shelters…places to stay just because…even if you are not worthy of any reward for your work…because you are that destitute and you are a human.
Other churches in the heart of Salt Lake City will open their doors up on “Blue Code” nights when temperatures drop below 18 degrees. The gorgeous-temple like- Catholic church on South Temple will open its doors for those needing to eat and sleep on those cold nights.
Author and Catholic Priest Greg Boyle said in one of my favorite books of his, Tattoos on the Heart, “churches should smell like stinky feet.” When giving a Sunday sermon to disgusted attendees, who could smell the stinky feet and bodies of the homeless that had slept there the night before.
An internet search will show that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints DOES support some of these shelters financially. They have given millions to the Red Cross and agreed to use LDS meeting houses for disaster relief. And of course there are extra non tithing donations made by the Giving Machines.
I LOVE this. I want to see more of this. I want to see a financial breakdown of all the donations the church has given and to whom they have given them. Take that light out from under a bushel and show the people what is being done with the money donated.
I don’t want to dig through news articles. I want an easy access spreadsheet provided yearly. I want to be proud of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
The difference to be noted here is disaster relief. Welfare Square does aid the destitute, but a family member who once worked there noted to me once, there are no handouts. I see the value of making people work for their food and accommodations- it’s incredibly valuable and lifting…teach a man how to fish…verse just give him one to eat. We are all about self reliance in the church and there is value in that. But there is a big gap in needs and capability.
The poor will always be among us.
I look out into the dark streets beyond temple square and know what the night brings for other co-workers as I hear a distant siren. I then turn and walk back into the elegance of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Conference Center, free from anyone who makes us uncomfortable.
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