The Meaning of Hospitality
At it's core, the Catholic Worker Movement are the "guests": not the intentional communities, not the volunteers, not the donors, not the occasional Board, and certainly not anyone's idea about how to "fix" people! Research teams and social service planners can study and plan themselves silly, but the Catholic Worker insight and vocation is to recognize and serve the inherent dignity of every person who comes to a House of Hospitality in need -- without the prejudice of acceptable outcomes. Only with humble trepidation may anyone enter the sanctuary of another person's being to propose changes in them -- to make them more inclined to a socially acceptable definition of "success".
As servants of the marginalized, Catholic Workers enter a community and may indeed consider themselves as part of it. But few among the "staff" have ever really lived on the street -- to the point of losing the "promise of possibilities" in their life: to be homeless is to exist in the nowhere-land of knowing that if one simply went "poof" and disappeared, no one would notice, and no one would miss you. To be homeless is to exist in the certain knowing of unworthiness: to have that unworthiness pierce the interior of one's life and flood it with a radical despair and hopelessness that that then becomes one's fundamental life experience and reality. Again, it is only with humble trepidation that we can propose to know what is best for another human being, let alone for a crowd we lump together in our easy definitions of "homeless" and "marginalized".
Catholic Worker Houses of Hospitality stand under the "umbrella" of the recognition and practice of: hospitality is our first gift! You are welcome! Whew! What a difference that begins to make! Finally, that person is not shoved out the door and down the road where even dumpster diving can land one in jail for trespassing (how is it possible to trespass or steal from a dumpster?). Then, not only are a variety of services offered along with the food (which is usually pretty damn good), but that person is invited into a conversation. Names are exchanged, and eventually, stories, and eventually again, tears and laughter. And we might find ourselves then sweating side-by-side in mopping the floor. Volunteering becomes "I am good for something" which can then become, "I am special!"
Without filling out any forms, the person becomes part of a family. Opportunities and affirmations abound -- a process of re-inventing (or re-creating) our family backgrounds and histories. Maybe imagination will then set in and that person will begin to see herself as free from drugs, maybe a recovery program will beckon, maybe a job becomes a real possibility... a string of "maybe's" becomes a thread with which to weave the cloth of a new life experience. This is the deep meaning of the choice to be a "House of Hospitality". And somewhere mixed up in that very same deep meaning is our own discovery of just how broken we have been all along, and that Mother Teresa was right: our salvation is factually and intimately connected to the hunger of the poor for bread, justice, and roses! Not a bad way to live, nor a bad movement to be a part of!
The daily gift of presence keeps the focus on this radical vision of mission and hospitality -- with the "spice and herb" of knowing that whatever "next steps" an intentional community might dream, such as increasing housing options, work co-ops employing guests, or "farm" retreat centers to grace the homeless with vacations and creative opportunities, the dreams will have grown out of sustained conversations with the House guests. Having listened to the cries, calls, and challenges of the poor, the most consistent theme will always be, "We want to live!" As Catholic Workers, the mission of any House will never be to make folks learn how to "adjust and conform": Catholic Workers are not agents of a dominant culture that dehumanizes, psychologizes, and otherwise treats persons as things to use, abuse, and throw away. Catholic Workers are, instead, in the words of Peter Maurin, personalists, and this applies all across the board, in every response made to the needs of guests and the signs of the times.
Again, following the inspiration of both Peter Maurin and Dorothy Day: "The Catholic Worker believes in creating a new society within the shell of the old with the philosophy of the new, which is not a new philosophy but a very old philosophy, a philosophy so old, that it looks like new." One could go so far as to say that there is a definite Catholic Worker spirituality (which obviously carries over into a Catholic Worker politics and economics) and that is, in each and all of its dimensions, "Welcome Home". Welcome home to appreciation, respect, dignity, kindness, reverence, equality, justice, and peace. Welcome home to the daily construction of the new "solidarity paradigm" for the re-construction of culture. And welcome home to a personal and global rEvolution!
As servants of the marginalized, Catholic Workers enter a community and may indeed consider themselves as part of it. But few among the "staff" have ever really lived on the street -- to the point of losing the "promise of possibilities" in their life: to be homeless is to exist in the nowhere-land of knowing that if one simply went "poof" and disappeared, no one would notice, and no one would miss you. To be homeless is to exist in the certain knowing of unworthiness: to have that unworthiness pierce the interior of one's life and flood it with a radical despair and hopelessness that that then becomes one's fundamental life experience and reality. Again, it is only with humble trepidation that we can propose to know what is best for another human being, let alone for a crowd we lump together in our easy definitions of "homeless" and "marginalized".
Catholic Worker Houses of Hospitality stand under the "umbrella" of the recognition and practice of: hospitality is our first gift! You are welcome! Whew! What a difference that begins to make! Finally, that person is not shoved out the door and down the road where even dumpster diving can land one in jail for trespassing (how is it possible to trespass or steal from a dumpster?). Then, not only are a variety of services offered along with the food (which is usually pretty damn good), but that person is invited into a conversation. Names are exchanged, and eventually, stories, and eventually again, tears and laughter. And we might find ourselves then sweating side-by-side in mopping the floor. Volunteering becomes "I am good for something" which can then become, "I am special!"
Without filling out any forms, the person becomes part of a family. Opportunities and affirmations abound -- a process of re-inventing (or re-creating) our family backgrounds and histories. Maybe imagination will then set in and that person will begin to see herself as free from drugs, maybe a recovery program will beckon, maybe a job becomes a real possibility... a string of "maybe's" becomes a thread with which to weave the cloth of a new life experience. This is the deep meaning of the choice to be a "House of Hospitality". And somewhere mixed up in that very same deep meaning is our own discovery of just how broken we have been all along, and that Mother Teresa was right: our salvation is factually and intimately connected to the hunger of the poor for bread, justice, and roses! Not a bad way to live, nor a bad movement to be a part of!
The daily gift of presence keeps the focus on this radical vision of mission and hospitality -- with the "spice and herb" of knowing that whatever "next steps" an intentional community might dream, such as increasing housing options, work co-ops employing guests, or "farm" retreat centers to grace the homeless with vacations and creative opportunities, the dreams will have grown out of sustained conversations with the House guests. Having listened to the cries, calls, and challenges of the poor, the most consistent theme will always be, "We want to live!" As Catholic Workers, the mission of any House will never be to make folks learn how to "adjust and conform": Catholic Workers are not agents of a dominant culture that dehumanizes, psychologizes, and otherwise treats persons as things to use, abuse, and throw away. Catholic Workers are, instead, in the words of Peter Maurin, personalists, and this applies all across the board, in every response made to the needs of guests and the signs of the times.
Again, following the inspiration of both Peter Maurin and Dorothy Day: "The Catholic Worker believes in creating a new society within the shell of the old with the philosophy of the new, which is not a new philosophy but a very old philosophy, a philosophy so old, that it looks like new." One could go so far as to say that there is a definite Catholic Worker spirituality (which obviously carries over into a Catholic Worker politics and economics) and that is, in each and all of its dimensions, "Welcome Home". Welcome home to appreciation, respect, dignity, kindness, reverence, equality, justice, and peace. Welcome home to the daily construction of the new "solidarity paradigm" for the re-construction of culture. And welcome home to a personal and global rEvolution!