How many times in life have we had a preconception about who someone was or what type of personality that person had before we even took the chance to talk and really get to know them? If your life has been anything like mine, I would guess that this happens to you multiple times a day, hundreds of times a year and thousands of times throughout our existence. Coming to Fr. Carr's Place2B has changed the way that I see the world of homelessness and what a homeless person is.
It has even changed how I would define homelessness. To look into this topic further, one must first ask the basic question... "What does it mean to be homeless?" or "How can you tell if a person is homeless." What does it really mean? Are there certain qualifications? Does it mean you don't have a certain amount of money? Does it mean you're a criminal? Does it mean that someone is really lazy and decided they didn't want to do any work? Therefore they don't have money for a home... Does it mean that they have a mental illness or that they just grew up in a bad neighborhood without a decent family or a home with food? For all you know, someone could be homeless because of a declining economy that led to them being laid off or they just simply got fired.
I have lived in Oshkosh the entire 22 years of my existence and I have been aware of Fr. Carr's Place2B almost the entire time because of random oppurtunities I have had to help out periodically as well as Fr. Carr coming to mass at school. The entire time before I decided to move in, I had these ideas that Fr. Carr's was an extremely disgusting place and although I never would have said it out loud, I considered the people there to be 2nd class and almost not worthy to be in the same car as me. I remember feeling an uneasiness anytime that one of the "homeless" people were even in the same room as me. This really makes me seem like an awful person and maybe I was a more awful person at that time of my life... but why? Why did I have these ideas or preconceptions? What was the cause of this discomforted feeling everytime I was in the same viscinity as a Fr. Carr's resident?
I truly believe that the society and upbringing that I went through had a big part to do with it. Anytime you see a homeless person on tv, you never get to know them as a person, you see someone in an old, dirty jacket and had who is beggin for food and if he cannot get food, than he is taking the next step to steal it. I think I began to create images in my head to what I truly thought homelessness was. All of our childhoods were filled with our parents, teachers, and pastors telling us to never talk to strangers and stay away from anyone who we didn't know well. Don't come to the door unless you looked through the window and knew who it was. If you actually sit back and think of how deranged and backwards that actually is... What kind of a world do we live in that we grow up learning not to talk to people we haven't met before?
It has been right around 370 days since I first moved in and stayed my first night at Fr. Carr's and wow... things have changed. I can only explain this change in one way and I feel that it really covers my whole preconception. Before I moved in, I saw the homeless people at Fr. Carr's as 2nd class citizens and as sick as it may sound... I really didn't see or understand they had humanity.
But when I first moved in, my boss asked me and the other newcomers to treat everyone as if they were Christ walking through our doors. Now this is a very good way to go through life and really helps in working here, but it never really worked for me. I have images in my head of what Christ is, right or wrong, and what I would do if he really walked through our doors. I can assure you that I never fall to my knees before these people or pray to them as I would if Christ actually walked through these doors.
So what does this mean? Have I actually changed? Christ came down and taught us a few central things. One of the main ones was to love all of mankind and treat everyone equally no matter what their past may contain. I feel that I have been able to exist here and treat the homeless well because of this general teaching Christ showed the world. It was not an overnight process though. In the beginning few months, I was never really that close with any of the men and I definitely fell short of creating any sort of relationship with any of them. Over the last half year or so though, I think that I have begun to see humanity in these men. It is easy to say that you're going to treat them well but it is another thing to actually do it. It was not that my boss told me to treat them as Christ that really lead to my change. It was just that eventually, after spending time with them, and having real conversations with these men that really resulted in the change.
Once I began to develop a relationship with a few of the men, I started to understand that these were actual human beings. This helped me begin to look at all of the men better too once I understood a few of them. I could tell people over and over that these men were real people who deserved our service and respect but it wasn't until I truly understood it and experienced it myself that I feel I came to %100 believe in it.
I definitely have begun to ramble on here a little bit, but the point of all this is that sometimes we have these ideas in our heads of what someone or something is. I think that we need to free ourselves of these preconceptions because they can trap us. They will prevent us from getting to really know people and even can stop us from meeting new people. They can halt us from seeing people as they really are and even sometimes, as in my case, lead to this idea that they are 2nd class citizens. I came to realize this through a series of experiences where I live but I urge everyone else to take down their walls before they meet someone new. The general goal is to treat everyone you meet as an actual person just as Christ would have. Remember that no matter what situation another person is in, it doesn't always define them. That could as easily be me or you someday.
