The headline cried “Saskatoon bishop tries out homelessness for 36 hours in charity challenge“.
It caught my attention. Perhaps because Father Pat Griffin eloquently reminded us recently that Vincent felt the pain for the poor… and they knew that.
An undeniable element in the character of St. Vincent was his ability to enter into the feelings of the poor.
My second thought on the headline was “even bishops can learn from ‘urban plunges.’
The Catholic Sun article noted…
Thirty-six hours may not seem like a long time to be without a home, but for Bishop Donald J. Bolen of Saskatoon and nine others, it was long enough to better understand what being homeless is really like.
The bishop, who lives in an apartment in central Saskatoon, said the brief experience of living on the streets opened his eyes.
“The most powerful experience was the vulnerability of the situations that we were in,” Bishop Bolen said after the June 17-18 Sanctum Survivor event to raise funds for Sanctum Care Group, which provides hospice and transitional care for homeless people and individuals struggling with the virus that causes AIDS.
“There are a whole lot of things in my neighborhood that I knew were there and I acknowledged their existence, but I got to see firsthand a lot more of the hurt and the pain in the neighborhood, as well as the joy, and the simple relationships that exist.”
The bishop confessed that the challenges homeless people face are overlooked when driving a car or rushing to get somewhere. Participants were given a list of tasks to complete during their day-and-a-half of homelessness to demonstrate how even simple undertakings can become daunting for those with limited resources and no place to call home.
“The slowing down of pace and being present in the neighborhood was a very revealing thing,” Bishop Bolen explained. “Once you go slow and you go vulnerably and you are willing to take on each situation and enter into relationship, enter into dialogue, there is a lot of take home in that.”
[A related article: The effect being ‘homeless’ had on actor Richard Gere]
Read the rest of Saskatoon bishop tries out homelessness for 36 hours for more of what surprised the bishop and the other high profile participants.
By Kiply Lukan Yaworski, Catholic News Service.
Some thoughts…
- Do I slow down enough to experience what people do to survive?
- Would I be willing to plunge into the pain of others?
- Can I really say I “feel your pain”?
- Pray the following scriptures…
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