World Homeless Day

October 10 is designated as World Homeless Day. Each year on 10/10, more than 100 nations work to bring awareness to the homeless among us. “The purpose of World Homeless Day is to draw attention to homeless people’s needs locally and provide opportunities for the community to get involved in responding to homelessness, while taking advantage of the stage an ‘international day’ provides” (http://www.worldhomelessday.org/) 

As you consider the needs of homeless people, please keep these specifics in mind:

·         Many people in our community are but 1 paycheck away from being homeless.

·         The economy is not the only, nor is it the major, cause of homelessness. Many people become homeless due to a series of unfortunate decisions, some of them economic.

·         With the number of shelters and resources in any community, there is no reason for anyone to be unsheltered.

·         Not all who pose as being homeless actually are. There are those who, unfortunately, capitalize on the compassion that is aroused in good people when they are confronted by someone who holds a sign or begs for money.

·         There is no stereotype of a homeless person. Over the years, the Rescue Mission of Mahoning Valley has helped people with a variety of backgrounds: nurses, single mothers with children, single fathers with children, mortgage brokers, skilled tradespeople, university professors, and the list goes on.

·         The best way to address the homeless issue is to support agencies that deal directly with homeless people. They have the resources and expertise to provide the proper kind of assistance.

Another Post Article

Follow this link for another article on the Rescue Mission in the Huffington Post.

Factoids

These are taken from the March/April edition of Rescue, the bimonthly publication of the AGRM:


Two Different Worlds: 20 to 25% of the homeless population in the United States suffers from some sort of severe mental illness. 6% of the general population of Americans is severely mentally ill. (Source: Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration/National Coalition for the Homeless.)

How Abuse Affects Homelessness: Approximately 21% of homeless families and 25% of single homeless women are homeless due to domestic violence. One national survey found that domestic violence was the second most frequently stated reason for homelessness for families. The National Alliance to End Homelessness notes: “Many homeless women have been victims of domestic violence at some point in their past, even if they do not identify it as the immediate cause of their homelessness.” (Source: Up With Women)

Rescue Mission in Huffington Post

Exit the Madison Avenue Expressway onto Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, just beyond a road sign advertising the Museum of Industry and Labor, and an elegant, pre-war building, red brick and multi-gabled, rises on your right. Built in 1931 and the former home of the West Federal YMCA branch, it is now owned by the Rescue Mission of Mahoning Valley, which houses dozens of this town's homeless residents.

So reads the opening paragraph of Senior Reporter Tom Zeller’s report on Youngstown, poverty, and politics in The Huffington Post. Follow the link to read the entire story.

Extreme Makeover for Mission Kitchen

Thanks to the generosity of The Youngstown Foundation, the Home Savings Charitable Foundation, and The Walter E. and Caroline H. Watson Foundation, Rescue Mission of Mahoning Valley can start to work on the next 1,300,000 meals for the hungry and homeless in our Valley. A combined $ 35,000.00 was awarded to The Mission for the purchase and installation of new kitchen and dining room equipment as well as a domestic hot water boiler replacing that which has enabled The Mission for the past ten years to deliver over 1,300,000 meals. Local companies, W. C. Zabel Company and Prout Boiler, Heating & Welding, Inc. delivered and installed the new equipment.

Drive Thru

Watch a great clip from 34 West's performance of We Go Everywhere Together at the Rescue Mission Dinner Theater.

Mental Illness

Mental illness is a fact of life within the homeless population. Does homelessness result from mental illness, or is it a contributor to it? This is probably a “which came first the chicken or the egg” kind of question. Currently, at the Rescue Mission of Mahoning Valley we are seeing that about 30% of those who enter the shelter self-admit to a mental health diagnosis. This may be anything from “simple” depression to chronic schizophrenia.


People with mental illness are not always the easiest people to love, but they are people – real people who struggle with huge issues, but people who were made in the image of God. A cup of cold water given in the name of Jesus to one of the “least of these” is a cup given to Christ