Tonight I had the most interesting encounter on my way home. I missed the train I intended to catch and had an opportunity to speak with some of LA’s finest department. Police.
We began to speak about the homelessness issue that is consuming our county and the solutions to begin to mend the problem. I was super grateful to hear one officer explain why homelessness exists with such insight while his partner stepped back from the conversation as soon as he heard me say I work in homeless services.
As the train approach and finally boarded the conversation continued. Then it happened …. he said began to say how it can be fixed.
First contact family for support
Second contact churches for support
Third and finally contact government.
In this order he listed them confidently that one of these will solve it. Completely stunned. I stood there to take it in. To think about what he was saying and what he meant by it.
Then we arrived at:
Family sometimes isn’t always able
Churches overall aren’t always willing
The government isn’t always helping
Then a woman quickly jumped down that churches aren’t helping. She proclaimed that all churches are belong and that people choose to be homeless.
‘I am sorry ma’am – every homeless person choose to be homeless?’
absolutely she said with this self righteous attitude and began to tell me how people choose to be strung out on drugs and sleep in the street.
Man this rocked me to my core. As I continued to process the police officers took a different stance in our conversation they began to feel like they had to deescalate this conversation. As this women proceed to speak to me as if I was uneducated and disconnect from the reality that every day when I go to work there are people who desperately don’t want to be in the situations they are, people that struggling to be the best versions of themselves to check the boxes for family, churches, and government to help them.
I am not saying you have to be passionate about the homeless. I am not saying you have to get out there and make sure justice is being done by those in power to fix it.
I am saying if you aren’t actively working to find solutions to a problem that’s being discussed don’t spent time casting judgment and picking arguments. There is a lane that we all belong in find yours and stay in it. Period!
I am grateful to get more insight on how people view others in the world around them and how to help.
I pray that God gives the nation I live in a heart of compassion. I pray that I also have a heart of empathy and decrease my judgmental being.
God please heal our world. Please help us see each other and help each other. I pray this and more in the mighty name of Jesus amen
Krys Grant-Ray 