I was at Mass recently, and during the homily Father was talking about the homeless. He said that we should help them, but never give them money. He said giving the homeless money was not helping them, but enabling them to stay homeless. My wife and I were discussing it later, quite offended, as we often give money to the homeless.
The first thing that came to my mind was a homeless friend of ours who works very hard at the labor hall. For various reasons involving the pay rate, cost of fast food (being homeless he has no refrigerator or stove or pantry), cost of laundry at the laundromat, etc, he sometimes doesn’t gave bus fare to get to work or keep his appointments. So we help him with bus fare. I thought, “what gives Father the nerve to say we’re not helping?” Does he know everyone’s situation? Who made him judge of a person’s motives or needs? He never even speaks to homeless people that I know of. It’s easy for him to live in the nice house his parishioners pay for, drive the nice car his flock bought him, wear the nice clothes someone else paid for, and then presume to speak so callously of people he doesn’t know from Adam.
My first impulse was to ask him if he would tell Holy Father Francis the same thing. The Pope is known for sneaking out at night and giving money to Rome’s homeless. Or what does he think of the Holy Father’s namesake? Saint Francis left his wealth and moved to the streets and started begging. He took no vows and joined no order. He chose to be homeless. What if the person I’m giving money to chooses to live in poverty? Is it different because they don’t take vows and get the church’s approval to be beggars? I cannot believe the lack of charity in this servant of God, to say I’m wrong to give my money to the homeless in the evil days, especially in capitalist America, where the rich are saints, the poor are devils, banks are churches and money is god. Has the evil of capitalism seeped so far into our Church that one is considered unworthy of respect because they are poor, and obviously not making a profit for anyone (or maybe it’s that they aren’t giving large sums to the Church?)
I am not sure how to do this politely, but I think you need an attitude check. You speak about one instance of giving money to someone who is working and to whom you give bus fare, and from that you seem to find criticism of the priest concerning a topic which, from the post, indicates you have little or no real factual knowledge.
In the past I served on the board of directors of the Matt Talbot Center here in Portland. The center was there for housing the homeless and was focused particularly on alcoholics. Since that time, homelessness has increased, and is a serious problem.
Studies have been done showing that people standing out by traffic signs, etc (that is, along highways and intersections) average about $30 per hour - not gross, but net, since they are not paying any taxes.
There is no doubt that there are among them some who are simply down on their luck.
There are also a very high degree of individuals, including but not limited to those, who suffer from mental illness/disease, alcoholism, drug addiction or a combination of those issues. Giving them a dollar, or a five or ten, makes people feel good, but it all too often does not help the individual, but rather goes to their habit.
Taking umbrage with the priest because of an isolated circumstance indicates, IMHO, an underlying issue and I am not exactly sure what it is; but I can guarantee from my background and experience that the priest is correct; handing out money to most of those down on their luck does way more harm than good, your individual experience with one person not to the contrary.
Don’t get me wrong - I support what you do with that individual. What I absolutely do not support is your going from that one instance to some sort of universal, with an apparent lack of knowledge as to what is actually and really going on.
Soup kitchens, drop-in centers, job training, drug and alcohol counseling, clothing and emergency food centers, and host of other projects and programs are trying to treat the needs instead of simply taking the route of a feel-good act which is so often misguided. And all of those programs take money, time, donations, and bodies to make the projects work.
Take, for example, meth. It is a scourge of astounding damage; one should take a look at pictures of people who have become meth addicts - the aging process and the speed with which it occurs is beyond astounding. So a person sees someone on the sidewalk begging; that potential donor doesn’t know if they are a meth addict but they look physically in serious shape, and in sympathy the donor gives them a buck, or two, or five. And 20 or thirty people behind you, someone does the same, and both of you are supporting that habit, which as sure as I am writing, is going to kill them soon. The same could be said for crack, or heroin, or alcohol, with perhaps just less speed towards death.
No, not every begging person is an addict or suffering from mental issues. And neither are most donors equipped to sort out who needs help and who doesn’t.
And instead of taking umbrage with our priests who in a short homily are trying to impart valid and true knowledge, we need to ask for more information. A knee-jerk response, founded on an isolated example is a poor way of determining if Father may actually know what he is taking about. We tend to think we “know” a lot, when actually, we know, in truth, very little.
