(Un)Sheltered Theology

In November, I started working at a local homeless shelter. Since the first day at the shelter, I've heard stories and had experiences that beg to be told. They warrant telling because they are the gospel in a way I've never known before.

These stories are not the stories of others, although the stories of others are intertwined here. Sometimes you will read the stories of others as seen through my eyes and reflected upon by me, as that is all I can give you of the men. What follows are my stories and my reflections. I am not trying to tell their stories here, except where their stories merit telling for the gospel's sake. And even then, the story is still mine. If you want to hear the voices of the voiceless--voices taken away by society--you'll have to look elsewhere.

And the stories told here are yours, too. When you read, my story intertwines with yours, whether you like it or not and whether you agree with my reflections or not. If you react against my reflections, your reaction to me is now part of your story. If you choose to read any of these stories, the longs ones and/or the short ones, you are reading their story, my story, and your story all mixed into one. Separable, but inseparable. What is theirs is mine, is yours. What is yours is mine, is theirs.

Should you choose to read, you are becoming one with me and them, casting off the us/them alterity set up in a capitalistic society where the homeless are without home and place. They have no home in the land and no place in society. You will find yourself swept under the rug of culture and you will think of the men when you rest your head in your home.

You will also read the gospel here. At times, my reflections may raise theological red flags. I may not always sound "Christian" in the traditional sense. I find myself becoming "Christian" in a way I never knew possible and my words reflect this journey. Perhaps these stories reflect a Christianity not everyone needs to know, but it is a way I have long yearned to experience. Theology from the shelter isn't the safe, sheltered theology I once knew, a theology that didn't think much about the shelter--the building, the men inside it, the men outside it, and marginalized people in general.

Should you choose to read any of my stories--their stories, your stories--you will also read Christ's story, God's story, the story of Israel, and the story of the Church. You will read the story of humanity: the gospel, the mystery of Immanuel and theodicy--God with us, a God who is love in the midst of a reality of pain and suffering.

It won't always be easy to read. These stories have stolen tears of joy and sorrow from. All my reflections are bittersweet. Be prepare to feel, but don't feel guilty. Feel sad and cry. Laugh and feel joy. Let the Spirit breathe on you, inspiring you to new life and rebirth. Be invigorated and move from these words to action and reflection, but feel no guilt. Perhaps I will write a reflection on how I have handled and reacted against guilt in my new experiences.

I am not going to use real names, not even the name of the shelter, to respect the men in the shelter and to protect my job. These texts may break the confidentiality agreement I signed when I took the job. I hope my supervisors, the men at the shelter, and God can forgive me for any breaches of trust I might be committing. But I feel the call of the gospel so strong in this venture.

I don't plan to do too much other censoring, because I want to present you with what I hear. Neither do I go out of my way to use cuss words. I have already written a number of reflections and I not only refer to what I affectionately call "the F-bomb," but I also type the word in quoting what the men say, or, in one instance thus far, what I said in order to build some rapport and cultivate pathos. That use of the F-bomb was single-handedly my best use of that word ever. You should have seen the smile on the man's face when I said it. I know many people would not approve of my using the word, but I am not asking you to agree with me, although I hope you endure it for the sake of hearing a retelling of the gospel. As the shelter does not put up with the use of racial slurs, I have not heard but one such slur while in the shelter and it is not in any of my stories.