Spirit On The Margins

Dear friends,

Based on the huge success of this offering in the spring, we are pleased to offer the “Will You Drink From This Cup?” program for the fall of 08.

The details of the program can be found here (click below) including testimonials from the spring program - 4 pages in all.  We hope and pray this program will speak to the desires of the heart for you and many others for years to come.

city-house-cup-program-brochure-fall-08

We held our last session of the “Will You Drink From This Cup?”  pilot program this past week. For those of you that don’t know the history, it is a 12 week spiritual enrichment program for mainstream learners.  It is for those who want to deepen their relationship with God, with the poor, and in a supportive environment of fellow learners.  The expectation is that learners be in at least one relationship with someone who finds themselves on the margins of society, and to pray for a half hour a day, with reflection on selected saints and writers.

During this last session, each person commented on the following question: What about this program surprised you, delighted you, disappointed you, changed you, challenged you?  Here were some of the responses:

“Our own brokenness is our door to the world.”

“I was surprised by how experiential tihs program was.”

“I liked being with people that also look for other things to make their lives richer.”

“I appreciated the intentionality of the group and doing it together.”

“I also learned from the things that did not go smoothly and where there were difficulties.”

“When I was visiting with my friend on the margins, I felt this enormous rush of love that melded me to her. I didn’t ask for it, it was a gift.”

“Now, as I drive by someone begging on the corner, I know that they have a very rich story.”

“Now when I walk down the street in an area that would have scared me before, I want instead to know the story of the people around me. I have less fear now and more curiosity.”

“I let go of another layer of fear in my life.”

“We care about the poor, but we don’t know them.”

“The poor have great hearts.  When we take away their circumstances, they are no different than any of us.”

For me, this experience finally created a sense of community at City House that I have craved for the last 6 years. What a blessing it has been. I am grateful.

Our topic at our last “Will You Drink From This Cup?” program was pain and suffering. Our guest presenters were Trindad and Terry Shaughnessy. Terry is a City House spiritual companion volunteer and has developed a long term relationship with Trinidad, an immigrant from the Caribbean island of Trinidad, that found himself homeless in the streets of St Paul.  (See City House newsletter article written by Terry, “Reflections on a day with homelessness” about his day on the streets of St Paul with Trinidad.) 

Reflections on a day

The use of childern as soldiers is a human rights violation in various parts of the world. Apparently, that is also true in the history of the nation of Trinidad.

trinidad-child-soldiers

Trinidad (the person presenting at our session) talked about becoming a soldier at age 12.  His parents were murdered when he was 17. For his entire adult life, he has had flashbacks of his earlier life as a child soldier.  At one point, the flashbacks were so severe that he could not sleep for 30 days.  Eventually, the father of a friend brought him to the United States.

He wound up sleeping on the floor of the Dorothy Day homeless shelter in St Paul for 7 months.  “I would sleep for only 2 hours a night, while I was there. I would get up and clean up the park and the streets as a way to deal with my anger and pain about where I was in life.”

“When I was young, hatred kept me alive, but not now.  Now I am a soldier of kindness, happiness, and humor.  I am a survivor. I learned that I could survive any situation.”  Today, Trinidad is known on the streets of St Paul as an ambassador that people trust.  His trademark is humor and he likes to use it to defuse even the most difficult situations and the meanest people he encounters.  ”You dropped something mam,” he says to one of the learners in our class, as he points at the floor. As the woman looks down he says, ”your smile.”  I’ve heard him use this one so often, it has lost its charm on me.  But, it seems to work on this woman.

Terry, our City House volunteer, talked about what he has learned from Trinidad.  Trinidad has taught him about the importance of the use of humor and how to put people at ease. When asked by a learner about the biggest obstacle he had to overcome in his relationship with Trinidad, he says, “fear.”

Terry and Trinidad make it clear to each other in front us that they have a deep appreciation and even love for each other. They both acknowledged the size of the other’s heart.

What a blessed evening.

Learners from the “Will You Drink From This Cup?” program and participants of the Reentry Metro program

Another astounding story we heard on our inner city pilgrimage for the “Will You Drink From This Cup?” program was from a woman we will call Martha. She lives at Reentry Metro, a half way house for women going into or coming out of prison.

RS Eden Reentry Metro

On the day of our pilgrimage, Martha was fearful. She had been convicted in federal court and was awaiting her sentencing 3 days later, for up to 2 1/2 years in federal prison. She had been convicted of an armed bank robbery. It was hard to imagine this beautiful and sensitive woman sitting in front of us as an armed bank robber. In fact, it was clear that another participant in the room from Reentry Metro saw her as an older and compassionate mentor. Yet, here she was.

As the story unfolded, she explained that her problems all started with undiagnosed mental illness. She suffered from depression and was finally so tired of living with her condition that she decided to commit cop suicide. That is, she robbed a bank with the intent of the police shooting her as a way to kill herself.  She used a bee bee gun to do the robbery and then climbed into her car, waiting for the police to shoot her.

Suicide by cop Wikipedia

Fortunately for her, the police did not shoot her. She was finally diagnosed properly, and she is doing much better now because of having the proper medications. Her biggest fear was regressing in her mental illness as a result of being in prison.

We left there promising to pray for her and believing that a great injustice would be done to sentence a woman like this to prison. To our delight, we heard later that the judge showed leniency and sentenced her to a different half way house, instead of the 2 1/2 year prison sentence that was possible. What a blessing.

Last weekend the learners from the “Will You Drink From This Cup?” program went on a one day inner city pilgrimage. We heard this amazing story from a guest by the name of Wayne at the Dorothy Day Center in downtown St. Paul. 

Wayne was trained as a mechanical engineer and employed by a well known engineering firm. He flew all over the country in his consulting engineering role. When his mother had a stroke, he chose to care for her. Her condition worsened as she moved into her 80s, and he finally quit his job to care for her full time.

In 2001, after he and his mother had used up all of their assets, she went into a nursing home, and for the first time in his life, Wayne became homeless. That’s when he became a guest of the Dorothy Day Center, a drop in homeless shelter.  Just recently, he finally got his life back together and has his own apartment.

“Will You Drink This Cup?” program learners at Dorothy Day 

He is one of the most articulate and well educated persons I have ever met in the sites which City House serves. He is known around Dorothy Day for mentoring younger guys and volunteering to do all kinds of odd jobs.

It was striking to hear him say, “Many of us are only a paycheck away from being homeless.”  It is the first time that I felt my own fear of being homeless disappear. I could see that Wayne, someone like me, had survived it and had even grown through the experience.

We held the orientation session for the “Will You Drink From This Cup?” program last Tuesday night. What a powerful group of people that was assembled. Learners were passionate about forming friendships with persons on the margins of society, and allowing God to form and shape them in those relationships.

Those of us in the middle class want to be respectful of persons who find themselves on the margins.  We think that we shouldn’t refer to “the poor” as “poor,” when they are in our presence, as if that would be insulting to them.

I have had the experience of speaking to middle class groups and having a person who finds themselves in poverty with me. I will refer to our work with “the poor” in front of them. I ask them afterwards if that is respectful, and they always say, “Yes, that is what I am. I am poor.” 

At this orientation session, learners were concerned about this subject. As one of our faculty members said, “They already know they are poor.” Then we all laughed at our quirky little insecurities.

“Can you drink the cup?  Can you empty it to the dregs?  Can you taste all the sorrows and joys?  Can you live your life to the full whatever it will bring?”

“But why should we drink this cup?  There is so much pain, so much anguish, so much violence. Why should we drink the cup?  Wouldn’t it be a lot easier to live normal lives with a minimum of pain and a maximum of pleasure?”

“In the midst of sorrows is consolation, in the midst of the darkness is light, in the midst of the despair is hope….The cup of sorrow, inconceivable as it seems, is also the cup of joy.  Only when we discover this in our life can we consider drinking it.”

Quotes from “Can You Drink the Cup?” by Henri Nouwen.

We are reading this book as a community of learners in the new City House program, “Will You Drink From This Cup?” The quotes came back to me over and over this week as I listened to people in both the mainstream and on the margins of society.

I heard the anguised story of a young man who lives with the terror of memories of his life growing up amidst violence.  He said, “People see my smiling all the time, and underneath I’m crying.” He has a lifetime of grieving the violent death of people close to him. He has nightmares about the violence done to him as a child and that he has pepetrated on others as an adult.

“The truth be told, I would rather die. Jesus, take me right now. It would be so much easier.”  He can not go back to his old life and the world into which he would like to move won’t accept him. He feels profoundly alone. And yet, something causes him to live with hope.  “I know that something is God,” he says.

In yet another conversation, a middle aged man begins tearing up as he tells me about the ongoing challenges with his rebellious teenage son. As I listen, more of Nenri Nouwen’s quotes come to mind.

“We didn’t choose our country, our parents, the color of our skin, our sexual orientation.  We didn’t even choose our character, intelligence, physical appearance, or mannerisms.  Sometimes we want to do every possible thing to change the circumstances of our life…A cry came out of our depth: “Why do I have to be this person?  I didn’t ask for it, and I don’t want it.”

“But as we gradually come to befriend our own reality, to look with compassion at our own sorrows and joys, and as we are able to discover the unique potential of our way of being in the world, we can move beyond our protest, put the cup of life to our lips and drink it, always carefully, but fully.”

Henri Nouwen Society website

We are humbled and pleased to present a new City House program. It is an expression of our newly expanded mission. We will continue to “tend to the spiritual life of the poor,”but in addition, we are now turning to the world and saying, “We have something for you too.” We are prayerfully expectant that some who read this will feel drawn to this unique experience.

“Will You Drink From This Cup?” Brochure Outside

“Will You Drink From This Cup?” Brochure Inside

To apply, please send us some background information in the mail.

Background Information Apply For “Will you Drink From This Cup?”

From left to right: Tamie Koehler, City House program manager; Deb Gorczycki, City House adminstrative manger; JoAnn Campbell, City House volunteer spiritual companion; Janet Hagberg, City House friend; and Pat Hendricks, Christos Center for Spiritual Formation, Executive Director

http://www.fslf.org/our_ministries/sabbath_house.html

A group of people passionate about the future of City House met Friday at the Sabbath House in south Minneapolis to plan and discern.  The question before us was whether to offer a new tuition based formation / enrichment program at City House called “Will You Drink From This Cup: Connecting with the Poor as a Spiritual Practice”.  As a result of participation in this 12 week program, each person would be able to:

1. Connect to and experience relatedness to persons on the margins of society
2. Understand and articulate for themselves: How God is shaping them in relationship with those who are poor; What “Poor in Spirit” means to them; How God has and is deepening their humanity; How God has and is meeting them in their suffering and pain; And if and how God is calling them to work with the poor.

The intended audience is:

1. Trained spiritual directors, especially City House volunteers.
2. Persons serious about their spirituality and their formation.
3. Persons with a heart for the poor.
4. Persons in the recovery community in the Twin Cities.

This pilot program will meet for 6 sessions over 12 weeks in February, March, and April, 2008.  Each session will run for 2 hours, with an hour of presentation and an hour of small group support and reflection time. 3 partial presentations will be made by City House participants (i.e. 3 persons from the margins of society). The program will also include a full day inner city pilgrimage, a 1/2 hour per day pray time reflecting on the great saints and writers that have worked with the poor, and 2 reflection assignments. Every registrant will be expected to be in at least one relationship with a person from the margins (as defined for themselves) during the 12 week program.

Christos Center for Siritual Formation would be a partner with City House in this venture. We are grateful to Pat Hendricks for her support and participation.

http://www.christoscenter.org/ 

Within 10 minutes of starting our conversation, the energy in the room was palpable. Everyone was jumping into implemenation before we had given any serious consideration to whether or not we ought to offer the program in the first place. Deb Gorczycki said, “I guess this means we think the program is a ‘go’.”  Everyone laughed in agreement.

The planning session ended with a lot of enthusiasm and hopes for what we might see happening in this new venture.  Watch for future announcements!!