At last night’s Park Slope Civic Council Meeting, there was a discussion of the homeless at Old First inspired by Pastor Daniel Meeter’s column on his blog. I am interested to hear from those who were there how it went. Rabbi Andy Bachman, who wasn’t at the meeting either (because he was off studying the Torah), heard that it was a “good first step.”
“Word on the Street” is that the meeting at the Park Slope Civic Council tonight was a good first step for our community’s desire to take another systematic look at the challenge of dealing with our homeless residents. Inspired by Pastor Meeter’s blog about his congregation, Old First, and their own issues with homeless men, members of his worship community and ours, Beth Elohim, joined together at the Civic Council to attempt to forge a communal response to the lowest rung on our society’s socio-economic ladder.
It seemed fitting that as the meeting was taking place, some of us were studying Torah, Beit Midrash style, and looking in particular at the theological mandate, laid out in Exodus, for God to hear the cry of the Israelite people under servitude in Egypt; for God to answer that cry; and, finally, for Moses to answer the answer, as it were, and agree to be God’s agent in liberating his people from the bondage to Pharaoh..
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Hi, OTBKB. I’m just back from some travels, and now have time to look at this machine.
I was pretty happy with the Civic Council’s openness. The discussion was typical (“why don’t they just go to a shelter”) but good. I am waiting to hear now from the Civic Council. Have they appointed a committee?