My U.N.I.T.E Weekend

U.N.I.T.E is a program run by the Center for Community Service and Justice that takes students into the city for a weekend and shows them, through experience, what is means to be homeless. When I first signed up, I had no idea what I was in for, I thought it was just a weekend of volunteering, no more than that, but I was in for so much more. Not only was U.N.I.T.E an eye opening experience for me, it completely changed my perspective on my own life as well. By seeing and experiencing the effects of poverty, I truly realized how blessed I was to lead such an amazing life. Being a Christian, I have been told all my life to “count my blessings” and “be thankful for what you got”, but not once has these sayings ever actually taken a hold of my life to become something meaningful. I have always known that I have been very blessed in my life to have a house over my head, a family, food, and an education, but it’s impossible to ever truly appreciate these things until you live without them. Similar to the feelings described in Barbara Hamby’s poem, Ode to American English, the speaker did not realize how much she loved America, until she was living without it. Every night I go to sleep, completely taking for granted the fact that I have a bed and a pillow to lay my head while every night in Baltimore people line up outside shelters hoping they will have a place to stay for the night. It is estimated that 3,000 people in Baltimore are homeless, and 1 out of 3 children in Baltimore live in poverty. That’s every day of their lives, 3,000 people in Baltimore walk the streets with nowhere to go, they live off of fast food because it’s the only food that comes cheap.

In a personal written account by Jo Goodwin Parker, a homeless women living in the 1970s, she says, “You ask me what is poverty? Listen to me. Here I am, dirty, smelly, and with no “proper” underwear on and with the stench of my rotting teeth near you. I will tell you. Listen to me. Listen without pity. I cannot use your pity. Listen with understanding.” In the essay she describes the life of poverty, of saving up for two months for a jar of Vasaline for her cracked and bleeding hands and her baby’s diaper rash only to try and buy it and finding out the price has gone up two cents. She says, “Poverty is an acid that drips on pride until all pride is worn away.” The Friday night before leaving campus we discussed how to treat people on the street if we were to encounter any, we learned that the worst thing you could do is ignore the person because this only makes them feel less like a human being. For some who are homeless, pride is all they have, even though they may have little to be prideful for. Living in poverty requires asking for help, begging, because your life depends on it, it strips you of your honor replacing it with shame.

Before going on U.N.I.T.E, we read the address made by Father Kolvenbach at Santa Clara University when he said, “We must therefore raise our Jesuit educational standard to “educate the whole person of solidarity for the real world.” Solidarity is learned through contact rather than through concepts…When the heart is touched by direct experience, the mind may be challenged to change.” If I hadn’t known better I would have assumed he was speaking of the U.N.I.T.E weekends here at Loyola because that is what truly happens, the mind changes. Before my U.N.I.T.E weekend I had seen poverty in a whole different light, I blamed the homeless for putting themselves in these circumstances by becoming drug addicts or alcoholics, and while it is true many have been abusers, many more have simply been born into the cycle of poverty, a cycle that is never-ending. That’s the thing about poverty, once you’re in its impossible to get out. You can’t get a job because you have no address, you have no address because you can’t get a job, the only way out is an education, but how do you get an education when you’re weak from not getting enough food, tired from protecting yourself from the rats that roam your apartment building, and don’t even have enough money for school supplies. Many have to quit school to work, many more see it as a hopeless struggle, I mean its easier to quit school for a job that pays $6.15 and hour, than continue school in the hopes of escaping the cycle, to get a job that doesn’t require you working with your back.

When I was volunteering at Beans and Bread, Flo the manager who hasn’t missed a day in eleven years, began the day with a prayer. In her prayer she thanked God for the beautiful day, for the fact that we all woke up this morning when so many hadn’t, she thanked God for us, and when she went around the room so many of those that were there to eat said thank you to us, and were so thankful that they had life, and that the sun was shining. It was amazing to hear how these people who have nothing, still found things to be thankful for, it made me see how I never even appreciated the many things I am blessed with. It made me think, why me? I wanted to ask God why I got to live this great life when so many struggled every day for survival. To me, volunteering is not about praise or being recognized, but its about being part of something bigger than yourself, its about serving rather than helping because helping implies that you are fixing something that is broken, and the lives of these people were certainly not broken. Right now I hear a bird outside the window and I am thankful for its song, and that the sun is shining, and that I go to a school as great as Loyola. For me it’s hard to write this blog because I feel like I can never truly express how truly touched I am through words alone, and I don’t think anyone will ever truly understand my experience until they experience for themselves. It was an experience beyond what words can describe, it was rejuvenating, enlightening, and most importantly inspiring. Before U.N.I.T.E I shielded myself from the realities of homelessness because it was painful to me to hear about and see these people, but what we all must realize is that these people did not do this to themselves, many were born into it, for many living on the verge of poverty it was simply something such as loosing their apartment that became the trigger for homelessness. Although all this sounds a little too touching, I hope everyone whether it be at Loyola or later in life gets to experience the same feelings that I have and are able to learn to appreciate all that god has given us.