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Most homeless are in the big cities, most churches are out in the boonies. The homeless are very unlikely to accept being bussed to a flyover state to sleep in a church in bumfuck nowhere. For a myriad of reasons.
Keep in mind also that a lot of them have a very hard time accepting any help due to past trauma as well.
It’s not a situation with a quick fix. Really the first step isn’t even ensuring housing for the homeless, it’s making sure we don’t get more homeless. We likely can’t save a subset of today’s homeless because they don’t want/or won’t accept any help that comes with any strings (like no drugs or just they can’t trash the place). But we can ensure no-one else ends up on the streets by beefing up mental healthcare and social services.
Churches “sponsor” people in other countries all the time. They could do the same for two people in the nearest city, they don’t have to force people to relocate.
There is actually an easy fix - build houses and give them to people. I remember when “Habitat for Humanity” was so much more prominent in churches.
I can’t tell if you are purposefully taking the post literally just to be able to shoot it down… But I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt
Just think of how many homeless people would actually refuse to live in any of these Mega mansions
Or better yet, imagine what these “churches” could do with the literal millions they spend in mansions and private jets to help the homeless… You know, if they actually care about that and were not just tax avoidance operations
Since I’m not American I keep forgetting about your for profit churches. The concept is just too foreign to me. When I think church I think of 300 year old cold stone building in the countryside.
Still there are homeless that would refuse, some from not believing or trusting you, some from not wanting to relocate even if it means that level of comfort, some from being deep into addiction thinking that they’ll be forced to get clean. And some will take you up on it and just absolutely trash the place trying to steal anything not bolted down.
That said the vast majority would for sure jump on it and thrive. So if it was at all possible to make happen it would be a good idea.
America definitely has its old, historic churches, but they’re far from common.
We have so many other kinds of churches, huge mega churches that essentially have a whole campus. Tiny churches in shopping centers. Growing up I went to a little church that was in the middle of an otherwise normal neighborhood.
I think you’re forgetting that a lot of churches are small fellowships co-opting an office space or like the other commenter said, out in the middle of nowhere. This wasn’t a post about mega churches, but it’s a fair point.
No I get it, not all churches really can… Nor it is assumed a feasible plan that they may all perfectly distribute the homeless population.
The point is that most churches only talk the talk. I was raised Catholic and never participated in church that did anything more than collect money to donate (and for itself of course). Sure they had some activities and talked a lot about helping others but it seemed the expectations was that we would go out and do good on their behalf
Megachurches are the minority of churches though
They have a hard time “accepting help” because as often as not; it isn’t really help.
Its libs jacking themselves off with the monkey paw; doing awful shit using nice words so they can feel good while being assholes.
Sure you get a room and three meals a day! No pets, must detox first, curfew but also you must have a job, and also dont mind the bars haha yes we do have to lock you in.
You must be out of your mind to prefer sleeping in drug riddled unsafe camps in a leaky tent to what you just described. You tried to make it look bad, but even with your hyperbole it really isn’t.
You’ve obviously never been homeless or had an animal you gave a shit about.
I love my dog. I only adopted her when I had the living space and security to take care of her. Strange how that works huh?
I wonder how much you actually care about an animal if you think it’s something to be used as leverage for not having to better your life.
Like half of Americans are one paycheck away from being homeless. So what point exactly are you making? That you’re morally superior for being better off? Or that we should wait until we have at least two paychecks saved? You have all the answers?
My answer seems to be living in a developed country in Europe. I can tell you, I felt very superior about the place I live walking the streets of San Francisco last year and being harassed by homeless people every street corner asking me for money or drugs.
Also yes, have at least two paychecks saved if that’s a possibility for you. It’s hilarious how you try to make your own advice seem like some alien concept that’s unachievable.
I didn’t feel morally superior at all, but the way you people are unable to come up with any good excuse why homeless people don’t want to use the help that’s available to them and instead turn into raging incoherent idiots is quickly changing that.
Had the dog when you became homeless.
Found a stray who helped you, with emotional support and doggishness(finding food, staying safe), as has been a thing since before humans ever slept inside anything other than a fucking cave, to survive.
Seems like you just want an excuse to hunt them for sport, because realizing they’re so fucking similar to you and youre like two pieces of paperwork (not even filed by you, doesn’t even need to be correct) away from being in that position is Fucking Terrifying, but you also don’t want to have a society where we don’t let this fucking happen to people, because you’re afraid you won’t get as many of your favorite treats.
Don’t be that guy.
Lmao all these assumptions and strawmen. It’s really not worth my time to respond to your incoherent ramble because I actually got my shit together. Good luck, don’t let your copium run out.
So you don’t deny any of it? Just deflect abd reassure yourself that ‘I have my shit together, so it can’t happen to me’
I mean, even before you get as far as the opinion of the homeless, most churches aren’t going to want to host two high-needs, possibly substance-addicted people from the big city in their atrium (“think of the children!”), which is the point of this.
It’s a situation that absolutely has a quick fix, just not a super cheap quick fix. It’s far easier to not formally address it, and leave the cost on them and whoever happens to be around them. There’s more than enough resources out to fix it if there was the political will.
Also there is a cheap quick fix, because there is adequate empty housing. Landlords just refuse to rent it. The people just need to confiscate unused housing after x (x being an appropriate number for the area) days not being a primary residence.
Not the government. The people. And if the resident leaves/dies, that housing goes to someone new. The landlord never gets it back. That’s important; they need to be afraid, but have an easy out (just put somebody in there, lower rent, etc)
I mean, taxing away houses and then giving them back to the homeless still counts as an expenditure. You’re probably going to want to give them each a nurse and a meal plan as well, if you want them to stick around, because as mentioned these people often have persistent issues.
Not the government. The people.
The people have never done shit. Not once in history.
Taxing is the government. They work for the owners, not the people dying on the street. Governments are all, at this moment in the supreme court, advocating for the right to criminalize sleeping outside even when there’s literally no other legal option.
The people have never done shit. Not once in history.
Oh. I guess every single history source I’ve ever read lied then. Thanks for informing me.
What have you been reading? Pretty much the only place where the people magically, spontaneously organise is in political speeches. The Patriots wouldn’t have existed without guys like Jefferson, the French revolution was run by rogue military factions and exclusive political clubs, and the Leninists have it right in their name.
The second shittiest roommate I ever had was a loud evangelical.
I was at the time actively the closest thing she would ever meet to a particular famous dude who died on the thing she worshipped, who she claimed to care about.
When she started fucking with my shit while I was out, I just made a bunch of copies of the house key and handed them out, so I’d have people to watch my door for me. Started cooking big dinners. She couldn’t actually say anything.
The trick is; don’t Fucking ask. Point out that sleeping in the park sucks and will get you killed by police, but meetings in the park are genuinely pleasant (unless climate change is real). They might shoot you, but they won’t be able to argue.
Apologies I didn’t understand what this means, did you hand out keys so your friends would randomly be over and she would be afraid of getting caught?
Friends? A couple, I hope I can call friends, but the rest just went to anyone unhoused who wanted a warm place to sleep/hang and a hot meal.
That is absolutely insane lmfao
Why? Worked out fine. Did get some meth smell in the drapes, but the guy smoking it was chill. I was a known quantity and nobody wanted to hurt me. Nobody took advantage of any vulnerabilities because everyone involved was providing for each other slightly better than the law allowed (the food was all stolen high end stuff).
And? Asshole roommate calmed right the fuck down.
Glad it worked out for you! That’s a hell of a way to mess with a roommate, is probably what OP means.
On that I agree 100%
just 2 people
What does this mean?
If every church houses two homeless people, no more homeless people.
Assuming the distribution is the same for both
(it’s not)
But the point is not invalid. It’s a problem that seems insurmountable but can definitely be tackled.
Although homeless people absolutely can and do migrate. They prefer cities for somewhat similar reasons to everyone else, and with no place they are allowed to live why not squat somewhere with lots of (begging/stealing/dumpsterdiving) opportunities and shorter walks?
Maybe OP believes every town in the US has exactly 1 church and 2 homeless people and is mildly infuriated that the church doesn’t allow the 2 homeless people to live there?
I think OP believes every town in the US has twice as many homeless people as churches, it doesnt need to be exactly 1 church and 2 homeless people.
But either way, that’s probably not true. Since homeless people tend to be in larger cities.
But then again, lots of people become homless in the suburbs and then move to the city to get the social services. If churches in the suburbs housed a few people as they become homeless, it would probably help. It’s better to keep people in their communities so they have a better chance of returning to housefullness.
But probably not that much, since homelessness rates are strongly correlated with housing prices, so expensive cities create more homelessness than cheap suburbs.
Not sure why you’d think OP is saying 1 church per town. Just that there are ~380k churches in the United States, and less than twice as many homeless people.
I agree, far too many people are left out in the cold at night when we have many public, climate-controlled buildings with working bathrooms and possibly even showers that are empty after a certain hour. If the homeless were able to regularly get a good night’s sleep and a shower in, they might be more able to hold down jobs and become contributing members of society again.
Schools certainly would be great as a shelter after hours, most have gyms with showers, possibly laundry machines, and certainly ample space for someone to sleep with a sleeping bag. If we could just figure out a way to make sure everything stays clean for students to use the next day, no left-behind drugs, no vandalism, etc. that could be a wonderful solution.
My guess is that in most places the homeless population would easily fit within the gymnasium alone.
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They’re implying that there are two homeless people for every church and that every church should house two homeless people to solve homelessness. Not agreeing with OP, just trying to answer your question.
and that every church should house two homeless people
Not even directly house. Even helping support those 2 people would go a long way toward demonstrating that churches actually do some good.
There’s only two more homeless people than churches in the United States. If we make every homeless person into a church, we can also have more churches.
I’m also confused by what the image itself is trying to say
If you take 2 of every homeless person in the US into one of every church in the US, there would be no more homeless people in the US.
1/2 million? seems sort of low
That rate of homelessness seems like a wild underestimate. However, I don’t know much about the southern united states other than that they basically export the homelessness they create to other states through bussing programs. So this number might be better calculated considering both the spatial distribution of homelessness and the spatial distribution of churches. With out knowing where the churches are and where the homeless are, the number is a bit beguiling. That being said, it does seem that its the areas with lots of churches that create the conditions for homelessness, and then those areas export the problem they create to other areas (rural red states have been bussing the homeless and other ‘undesirables’ to metro areas of blue states for decades, rather than fund and operate local solutions).
That being said, it does seem that its the areas with lots of churches that create the conditions for homelessness
Huh? Is this like a red state/blue state thing, or do you have something to indicate that towns with more churches generate more homeless? It doesn’t really make sense to me because homelessness is tied to housing prices, and cities are where housing is more expensive, and the ratio of church to population is probably a lot lower in cities.
It’s a red state blue state thing.
Red states (rural areas) deal with homelessness by buying the homeless bus tickets and sending them to metropolitan areas within blue states. Basically, red states create issues with homelessness because of their social policies, then externalize the consequences of those policies. This has been the case for decades. Before 2010 this was almost exclusively a red state issue. They would buy a homeless person a bus ticket to CA or NY and that was that. However, more recently some blue cities like Portland are trying the same strategy.
I thought this was common knowledge around homelessness in the US, that it was a blue state problem caused by red states.
Well it can’t be exclusively caused by red states, but I see what you mean. I’m just not a fan of the implication that churches have something to do with it.
Bruh who the duck do you think is buying the tickets.
It’s not an implication, it’s an direct consequence.
Churches are a toxic venom in the vein of society, this kind of exclusionary behavior is precisely why the exist.
You conflate Christianity with Republicanism. Please do not act like churches are the mastermind behind politicians who use vaguely church-scented branding to try to pander to Christians while acting against many of the principles laid out in the Bible.
You’re reaching
My home town had four churches and no homeless people. What homeless people are those churches supposed to help?
Meanwhile, in the city I now live in, there’s tons of churches and half of them give free food to the homeless every single day, and there’s lines going around the block at all of them.
There is no magic bullet that can solve homelessness. Anything proposed must be a part of a larger solution. There are tons of proposals that, if actually done and not half-assed, would help immensely.
I do not understand these downvotes. Like how dare you see churches that actually help the poor like they’re supposed to?
It’s people downvoting because “Religion = bad”.
When in reality it should be “Religion = institutions and institutions can be either good or bad or mix of both.”
Edit: Spelling
Those churches might have already helped. I’m no fan of religion for it’s various stupidities, but I am a fan of organized good will.
One per church?
They’re not spread out like churches though. Here, it might work, we have an insane # of churches per capita and a lot of homeless, but what about LA? No way there are as many churches as homeless there. Same with houses, as someone suggests upthread. There are few vacant spaces here and many who need homes but in any state beginning with the letter I maybe there are thousands of homes and few homeless because they would freeze to death in the winter.
ITT: People who don’t know homeless people can catch a ride to a different town like anyone else.
I mean, I don’t actually think in churches is the right idea, but that’s a nitpick, not a gotcha.
I hate the idea of treating homeless like babies. Most of these people got to where they are by choices. If they wanted to stay at the church they probably can. Most churches I know have cots for people down and out. If these people wanted to stay at the church they would have.
You have no clue wtf you’re talking about
Ever lived near a significant homeless population?
some homeless people got there by making bad choices.
But, you know what I’ll say it, making a few bad choices shouldn’t convict you to a life on the street and being treated as subhuman by people around you
I agree.
But you also can’t help someone unless they want to be helped. There are people out there who will take every advantage of any resources available while making absolutely no effort to change the pattern of behavior that led them there.
Motherfucker, I’ve been homeless a lot in my life and I live/work downtown, surrounded by all types of homeless.
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I can’t even imagine someone being this tone-deaf, and yet, here we are.
A good friend of mine had the audacity to develop a chronic health condition in America. He should’ve known better.
It was cancer.
Want to know how I became homeless? I turned 18, and my parents said, “Alright have a nice life, you’re 18 now don’t be home when I get back.” After 18 years of teaching me zero life skills. Took me until my late 20s to find stability, meanwhile being constantly harassed by police for looking for a place to rest between time at school and work.
And before you go to the obvious speculation that lazy commenters always do. I didn’t and don’t drink alcohol, don’t do drugs, spent all of my time building computers. My parents just didn’t like having to spend money on someone that wasn’t them. I was always in advanced classes in school and most always was a solid B student even with zero home support. If it wasn’t for me winning the genetic lottery with my mind, I’d likely be dead or in prison like most of my childhood friends.
But you know, this is an anecdote and has no value in the vast scheme of things. Data driven results are all that matter, and yet, they still disagree with your lazy assessment that people are the source of their own situation. Believe it or not, these questions have been asked and answered, yet you remain unaware of them. The safety and support systems in the society you live in dictate homelessness, and I can tell you first hand, we have none in my country.
But that’s all the energy I can send to you, its not useful trying to teach chess to a pigeon, at the end of the day you’re going to spread your shit around and knock over the board anyway (a summary of your comments in this thread).
Hope you open your eyes and your mind some day.
Footnote, if anyone cares about the ending to the homeless part of my story, I became a home owner in my 30s after living in rented rooms with Craigslist randoms for about a decade. Interesting times, most people are great.
Mic drop.
TLDR.
I need 21 words max. I’m kidding I read your pointless rant and I have only 1 observation. You are either stretching the truth or you are a liar. Take care my homeless friend.
Sometimes I feed the trolls.
Hope your belly is full.
But my story is what I said it was.
Pigeons do what pigeons do.No one reading this thread is surprised that 21 words is the limit of your cognition. I sincerely believe that you are doing your best.
Not only do I live pretty close to a tent city of homeless people, I’ve spent a lot of time in San Francisco interviewing homeless people there back when I was in high school working for the school paper.
You have no fucking clue what you’re talking about.
I too live near the San Francisco and know there is no linear answer. Odd how even in an anecdote we still corroborate that there are more factors to why homeless people cannot find housing. Odd. Does that mean we have confirmation bias? Or does that mean facts support our theories?
*Anecdote.
accidental double post
If churches are going to be a tax free non-profit, we need to see ‘services done’ at roughly a similar order of magnitude as their receipts would allow. And no, a couple of cots is not the answer. Perhaps a small apartment building with 8 units that the church owns and operates, and provides permanent residency for a small local population of the unhoused.
Other wise I think they church should be disbanded and its organizers held liable for tax fraud.
Well I don’t think you should go trying to disband someone’s religion. In my area Churches usually donate people and money to organizations that help the homeless. I’ve worked in the soup kitchens serving hundreds
I mean if they’ve got the receipts of how the money is spent like any other non-profit has to provide, I have no issue with it. If they can’t provide the receipts, that’s a for-profit institution, and should be taxed as such.
By definition of non profit they should not be making profit
If I run a 501-3c (and I have), I have to provide what amounts to a complete budget of where my organizations income came from, where it went to, and how much was spent on things like overhead, office expenses, executive pay, travel, etc. My board is responsible for me getting those numbers right, otherwise we run afoul of the IRS.
Churches are not held to the same standard. A church is effectively granted tax free status on its receipts (income) and is not required to provide any charitable services as a product of those receipts. They are fundamentally different legal entities, however, I’m arguing that they shouldn’t be, and that churches and “faith based” institutions should be held to the same standards as any other charitable organization under the 501c3 definition of a non-profit.
If your church or faith based organization doesn’t exist to provide a charitable mission, then it shouldn’t be free from taxation (or it should not exist).
Churches don’t make money. That wouldn’t make any sense unless someone is embezzling
Are you serious?? Like, honest to goodnesses, are you serious?
A lot of them have severe mental health issues
