February 1, 1995 – 7:04 pm
Hospitality vol. 14, no. 2 “Justice is important, but supper is essential” On a clear, cold and crisp December night in 1956, Hal Beaver hunkered over the Myers Park High School twenty-yard line. On the command “uagahee,” Paul Anderson snapped the pigskin to Hal. I darted from the right end of the line [...]
October 1, 1994 – 6:40 pm
Hospitality vol. 13, no. 10 When Homelessness is hell When Homelessness and poverty are public policy When Housing does not precede life When liberty is a cracked bell And equality is propaganda then Fear is planted Hate is harvested The American Dream becomes The American Nightmare. So let us listen to the classic [...]
September 1, 1994 – 6:14 pm
Hospitality vol. 13, no. 9 During the summer of 1990, members of the Open Door Community, 300 homeless friends, and supporters who joined in the jagged journey toward justice lived in the Imperial Hotel for 16 days. Many others brought food, blankets, songs, legal advice, prayers, and sermons. Others, to be honest, brought [...]
Hospitality, vol.13, no.6 Dante’s Hell offers place and stability, and given the coherence between crime and punishment, an interpretive order to one’s eternal agony. Unthinkable was it to the medieval imagination that a person has no place or that life is absurd. But on my back porch life often sways that way. Homelessness is [...]
Part VI Hospitality, vol. 13, no. 3 How does it feel How does it feel To be without a home Like a complete unknown Like a rolling stone? –Bob Dylan Like Hell –Ed Loring “Howdy. My name is Lazarus. Excuse me while I remove this gauze and shroud from my body. He [...]
January 1, 1994 – 5:46 pm
Part V: Housing Precedes Life Hospitality vol.13, no.1 Visitation Not long ago I was making a number of pastoral visits on the streets of Atlanta. I walked up to a vacant lot near Spring and 14th Streets and saw a friend. George was sitting on a wall that was, years earlier, the foundation [...]
September 1, 1993 – 4:57 pm
Hospitality vol. 12, no. 9 Calvin Kimbrough is an artist, an advocate for justice, and a partner at Patchwork Central, a sister community. Calvin is a great friend and when he comes for a visit, entering by the back door, hope and joy are always flowing out of his camera cases. Last October [...]
I Hear Hope Banging On My Back Door: Why Homelessness Exist in America PART IV, Space and Time I love the name, The Open Door Community. God gave us that name just as He gave names in biblical times. Early one morning an angel of the Lord appeared to me and said: [...]
Hospitality, vol. 12, no.4 We are gifted because we comfort one another, which is to be strengthened. We are gifted because the servanthood power of Jesus and the prophetic empowerment of Moses comfort us: strengthen us for the journey toward justice and the Beloved Community. We present our bodies in the streets and prison [...]
