It's unfortunate that it didn't receive the attention it deserved, but the Catholic Church announced this week that it had opened a homeless shelter in the Vatican. While the number of homeless folks it will service is small, the impact it has is huge. And it proves that when Pope Francis said, "How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?" that it was not only a statement about our priorities, but a mission to change them.
And it's nice to once in a while have something good to report about this crazy world of ours, and not just bitch, bitch, bitch about it.
Peace,
emaycee
Showing posts with label Homeless Shelters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Homeless Shelters. Show all posts
Thursday, October 15, 2015
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Walking a ways in another's shoes
Congresswoman Jackie Speier of California spent last Friday night at a homeless shelter in the Bay Area to get an idea of what it's like to be homeless in America. Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut did something similar late last year when he spent a day shadowing a homeless man.
On any given night, a little over 600,000 Americans will find themselves homeless, most of them for the simplest of reasons: they can't afford housing. Rep. Speier suggested that perhaps all members of Congress should do as she did (anyone see Ted Cruz or Rand Paul spending a night in a homeless shelter?) to learn more about what the homeless face each day.
You know, we constantly convene the best and the brightest of the business world to fix what ails the American economy without any tangible results. Perhaps Rep. Speier and Sen. Murphy are on to something--facing the problem where it actually is rather than in some hallowed hall full of bullshit artists.
With half of Congress being millionaires, though, it's kind of hard to imagine many of them spending a night slumming to better the lives of their constituents.
Probably a lot easier to stay home and count their money.
Peace,
emaycee
On any given night, a little over 600,000 Americans will find themselves homeless, most of them for the simplest of reasons: they can't afford housing. Rep. Speier suggested that perhaps all members of Congress should do as she did (anyone see Ted Cruz or Rand Paul spending a night in a homeless shelter?) to learn more about what the homeless face each day.
You know, we constantly convene the best and the brightest of the business world to fix what ails the American economy without any tangible results. Perhaps Rep. Speier and Sen. Murphy are on to something--facing the problem where it actually is rather than in some hallowed hall full of bullshit artists.
With half of Congress being millionaires, though, it's kind of hard to imagine many of them spending a night slumming to better the lives of their constituents.
Probably a lot easier to stay home and count their money.
Peace,
emaycee
Sunday, August 12, 2012
I used to be disgusted...
...now I'm just flat-assed pissed off.
It's been a horrible couple of weeks in the Detroit Free Press (not so good in the Detroit News, either, but it's a conservative publication and you gets whats you pays for)--so much so that I am seriously considering letting my subscription lapse when it expires in September. I've been reading newspapers since I was eight-years-old (no child prodigy, I started with the easy stuff: sports and the comics) and I've never been so utterly disgusted with the level of discourse and the slip-shod journalism. Misinformation--swear to God, it seems that several of their pundits are looking for jobs in the Beltway. Just brutal with the "trying to appear balanced even though we're reporting completely incorrect information and our opinions are so ill-informed..." ad nauseum.
And then...and then...I read a piece like this one and this one (disclaimer: they were written by my daughter) rooting out real life problems while exposing real life problems (homelessness and issues with local homeless shelters in a small Iowa town) and I think to myself maybe journalism isn't such a fucked up field, after all, that it's still capable of doing some good in this big old goofy world.
Maybe I just need to subscribe to a small town newspaper....
Peace,
emaycee
It's been a horrible couple of weeks in the Detroit Free Press (not so good in the Detroit News, either, but it's a conservative publication and you gets whats you pays for)--so much so that I am seriously considering letting my subscription lapse when it expires in September. I've been reading newspapers since I was eight-years-old (no child prodigy, I started with the easy stuff: sports and the comics) and I've never been so utterly disgusted with the level of discourse and the slip-shod journalism. Misinformation--swear to God, it seems that several of their pundits are looking for jobs in the Beltway. Just brutal with the "trying to appear balanced even though we're reporting completely incorrect information and our opinions are so ill-informed..." ad nauseum.
And then...and then...I read a piece like this one and this one (disclaimer: they were written by my daughter) rooting out real life problems while exposing real life problems (homelessness and issues with local homeless shelters in a small Iowa town) and I think to myself maybe journalism isn't such a fucked up field, after all, that it's still capable of doing some good in this big old goofy world.
Maybe I just need to subscribe to a small town newspaper....
Peace,
emaycee
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