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| "St. Jude Ave.", TC-4 (two years ago) |
Tent City 4 has asked St. Jude to host their homeless encampment this spring. We are in the process of the applying for a permit with the city. The proposed dates are from April 23 until near the end of July. This would be the third time that Tent City has visited Redmond.
Blessings,
Fr. Dave Rogerson
St. Jude Parish senior pastor
Redmond, WA.
425-883-7685
Photo By Yoder
from desk of Bob Yoder...
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COMMENT: OK. We get it already - there are poor people who don't have permanent homes and live in tents. Poverty and homelessness are an age-old problem. We've seen Tent City up-close and what it's like to be homeless (twice so far) and I do have sympathy, but hosting a 10-week camp out every other summer just doesn't solve their long-term social, mental and economic problems and creates security problems for the neighborhood. Maybe St. Jude's should work on building and funding a transitional housing facility, but not in the middle of a residential neighborhood.
-- By Anonymous, 3/8
I seem to recall that St Jude claimed that they would only host Tent City one time. Their promises are not to be believed with visit number three on the horizon.
ReplyDeleteI understand that St. Jude is paying a price for their repeated hosting of this encampment. We have heard from former and current parishioners that the attendance at weekly masses continue to decline ever since the first encampment was held.Perhaps this is one of the reasons.
I continue to ask why St. Jude feels it so important to place Tent City so near schools and right in the middle of a residential neighborhood. Perhaps the people no longer attending St. Jude can answer this question for us. Or would it be better for the Father to?
OK. We get it already - there are poor people who don't have permanent homes and live in tents. Poverty and homelessness are an age-old problem. We've seen Tent City up-close and what it's like to be homeless (twice so far) and I do have sympathy, but hosting a 10-week camp out every other summer just doesn't solve their long-term social, mental and economic problems and creates security problems for the neighborhood. Maybe St. Jude's should work on building and funding a transitional housing facility, but not in the middle of a residential neighborhood.
ReplyDelete"Perhaps the people no longer attending St. Jude can answer this question for us."
ReplyDeleteCan't help you there, since I started attending St. Jude's more once they decided to support this project. As a 15 year resident of the neighborhood I can tell you that I have yet to see any negative impact from Tent City.
In fact, during early morning jogs the remote corners of Hartman Park seems a bit safer when TC4 is nearby. Maybe the self-policing nature of TC4 encourages the local indigenous drug-selling crowd to keep a lower profile. There are fewer questionable groups huddling in cars every morning, and that's not a bad thing.
I understand the impulse for St. Jude’s to want to help the homeless; helping those “in need” is one of the rich traditions of many faiths. But surely they have done research on the tent city operation and they know that this is not a bunch of people who are ‘down on their luck’ and looking for a path to joining those who live indoors. They are a politically active group who advocate for the homeless and who is attempting to raise awareness by staging this corner theater.
ReplyDeleteSo, St. Jude’s, do you join in this deceptive ambition to ‘showcase’ homelessness, or is your mission to help these people? If you want to help them, why don’t you have them live, eat, and sleep inside the church rather than in a tent? Your neighbors would appreciate it, if not the activists.
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