Words for the church

I am grateful for your interest in our work.

We believe that everyone deserves proper housing. They support specific
projects that house those who are most vulnerable.

In simple terms we provides short term transitional housing for women with a history of street involvement, homelessness and prostitution. After a two year run the original project was closed due to lack of funding. After a four year closure, I am happy to report that we have now reopened.

My name is Dave and I am the project manager. The house is currently home to six women who came to us from shelters, the street or unsafe housing. By late January an additional 7 residents will be able to call our place their home.

Our place is made up or four houses, 16 bedrooms, 8 bathrooms, 4 kitchens, 4 living rooms and two laundry rooms. Within those walls women who find the courage to believe that change can happen in their lives are supported while they begin the precarious journey of reclaiming their lives. This journey will include facing the dark and difficult realities of addiction, mental and physical illness and relational brokenness. Beyond these challenges, women living with us are asked to consider the barriers which exist to their independence and success. Each woman owns a story marked with similar themes and characters. Labels and stigma attached to their stories make it difficult for them to imagine life in a home, with their children and a stable network of friends, supports and services to build a sustainable future.

During their stay with us, women and trans-gendered individuals are supported by a team of compassionate and supportive staff members. The staff endeavors to remain involved in each woman’s story and to support positive changes and steps toward independence. This can be an agonizingly slow series of steps. We rejoice in an appointment booked and kept, we celebrate when a resident asks for help in entering a treatment program. We feel that women are moving forward in their journey when they begin to consider housing options.

A measure of success happens when a client has come to the place where they choose to live in a community and accommodations of their own choosing. As transitional housing, we are able to provide an important step in getting there. The work of our team however does not end when a woman moves into her own apartment. The team then becomes part of the wrap around supports to build successful tenancy into each woman’s story. Women who move out to live independently are provided with a bed, dresser, kitchen table and chairs as well as bedding and towels. No one moves out into an empty place. Staff members are involved in the furnishing and outfitting of new housing.

In Jonathan Larson’s Broadway hit musical Rent a year in the life of its characters is broken down into minutes. The opening of the second act begins with the words:

525,600 minutes, 525,000 moments so dear.
525,600 minutes - how do you measure, measure a year?
In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee.
In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.
In 525,600 minutes - how do you measure a year in a life?

A year in the life of our program can be measured in minutes as well. It can be measured in the number of days someone stays clean, it can be measured in visits with children who hope to rejoin their mother in a home of their own. Days and hours mark the regimen of medications needed to ensure another year of life. A year can be measured in conversations that lead to decisions and relapses that create an opportunity to consider change yet again. Within the 525600 minutes of each year groceries and bus tickets will be needed; salaries and utilities will have to be paid. In order for the houses to be homes furniture must be purchased, bedding provided, fridges must be filled, clothes and life necessities must be provided.

During this season you will be given many opportunities to give to good and worthy causes. I want to thank-you for including us in your generosity. The broader questions within our society need to be asked: Why do we have to exist? What aspects of our society create a market price for women who are vulnerable or homeless? But those questions only find meaning when we realize that real women and girls with names and families are a part of our extended human family. They are at least worthy of respect and an opportunity to leave their lives of exploitation if they choose to. Their voices are often drowned out by the clamor of other legitimate needs. At least this morning allow me to join with these women and countless others who may pass through our door and ask you to remember these daughters, mothers and sisters. As a person of faith and as a Christian brother I count it a privilege to bring them to you today and speak for them when I say thank-you on their behalf.