OPINION: Everyone Is Our Neighbor
A Letter From Church And Synagogue Congregants And Leaders
Who is our neighbor and what responsibility do we have to them? That’s a question that we ask ourselves at Park Hill United Methodist Church and Temple Micah.
In the Gospel of Luke, the same question is posed to Christ and he responds with the parable of the Good Samaritan, which end with His radical response: everyone is our neighbor.
The COVID-19 pandemic laid bare the flaws in our systems and made it more apparent that many of our neighbors are struggling simply to survive.
The 2020 MDHI Point-In-Time Survey counted 6,104 men, women, and children who were experiencing homelessness in the seven-county Metro Denver area. Prior to COVID-19, our city was already struggling to provide adequate services to those who needed it; COVID-19 only exacerbated this problem. Our hearts broke as we looked at the data, and we wondered if there would be a way for us to help.
In 2020, the Colorado Village Collaborative began operating a city-sanctioned Safe Outdoor Space as a necessary step towards addressing the problems of homelessness and affordable housing. To quote Rev. Brian Henderson, whose First Baptist Church hosts another SOS site, these act as a “sacred safe sanctuary from crime and COVID for homeless people.”
When the Affordable Housing Task Force at Park Hill UMC was made aware of an opportunity to serve as the next SOS site, we knew that we needed to pursue it. It would serve as another step for us as a church to put our faith into action.
Park Hill UMC, a part of the Park Hill neighborhood for more than 110 years, has a long and rich history of social justice — from integrating racially as a church in the 1950’s and 60’s to practicing inclusion of our LGBQTIA+ siblings in all areas of our church, to acting as a sanctuary church for those in jeopardy of being deported and reading and mentoring students at Hallett Academy, we believe in putting our faith into action. This includes serving those experiencing homelessness, as we have done for the past seven years with the Women’s Homelessness Initiative.
Throughout our history and now, we feel a profound sense to put our mission into action and to help our neighbor, especially our most vulnerable neighbors.
We ask our neighbors in Park Hill and beyond to consider the role that they can play in not only housing our unhoused neighbors in the short term, but in shaping public policy in the long term. Homelessness isn’t just a “downtown problem” or a “Cap Hill problem.” It is, quite simply, a Denver problem.
It is apparent that there is the need for a Safe Outdoor Space through the rest of 2021.
To quote John Lewis, “If not us, then who? If not now, then when?”
Sarah and Manuel Aragon, Ruth Ann Russell, Susan Brown, Bruce Berger, Steve and Katie Holz-Russell, Drew O’Connor, Barb and Bob Sample, Mimi Finn, Mark Marshall, Peg Newell, Lincy Zipporah, Amy Beres, Tory Doerksen, Rabbi Adam Morris, Pastor Nathan Adams, Pastor Laura Rainwater