About a week and a half ago I took a trip out to SF with the rest of Breaking Bread's leadership. We visited Glide Memorial Church and Father River Sims. The purpose of our trip was capacity building, to see how we could do the work we do better. More simply and directly put, we went to learn. We received a PHENOMENAL grant from our church and were very excited to go.
Glide was the main purpose of our trip. Both a church and a foundation, Glide provides an array of services to the poor, homeless and those in need in the Tenderloin district of SF. They serve 2-3 THOUSAND people a day in their meals program. Yes, you did read that number correctly. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are served daily. Glide can also make shelter reservations through a city service to help their clients get into a shelter, offer a drop in/crisis center, a women's center, a nurse practitioner model health clinic and a few other services. Overall, it was fairly overwhelming to take in in just a couple short days.
Alongside the foundation and the social services, Glide is a United Methodist Church. Started with an unapologetic rootedness in liberation theology, they ministered mostly to crack addicts and their services on Sundays were fairly integrated with their clients. One of our main objectives of our trip was to understand how we as LaSalle can better do this. Today, however, Glide is more of a radically inclusive church, openly welcoming people of different races, colors, backgrounds, views, sexual orientations, etc. Their current focus is to be welcoming to the GLBT community. The Celebration, the name for their Sunday morning service, was incredible. It was the first time I have had seats reserved with a piece of paper and announced as official guests in church (pretty awesome!). I have never heard a choir and band (about 75 choir members and 8 band member) sound so amazing.
The other part of of trip was spent with Father River Sims. River spends his time ministering to people in the neighborhood where he lives, Polk street, and the Tenderloin, Haight and other districts. He has a ministry of presence and harm prevention among the young adult street population who are mostly drug users and sex workers. Basically, what River does is walk the streets, talk to people, be available for them to talk to and hands out socks, snacks, needles and condoms. He also cooks a meal for about 120 people twice a week. Watching the faces of everyone as they saw 'Reverend' approaching was incredible. They were so happy to see a face that cared, who didn't judge and who saw them as human. In talking to River he explained that what he does is lives in the moment, practices acts of mercy as Jesus calls us to in Matthew 25 and listens. He can't save anyone, only God does that work. Refreshing to hear.
It's obvious that we have a lot to work through after this trip. Our ministry of Breaking Bread is a weekly meal with a clothing room, nurse and health care worker. There is some live entertainment and we try and extend hospitality to our family. Glide is MUCH bigger and more social service oriented. Father Sims is on the streets, interacting with less people on a more personal level. We have a lot to learn from both as we move forward.
peace,
2 comments:
This sounds like it was an awesome trip! I'm excited to hear the ways you incorporate what you learned to your ministry at LaSalle and Breaking Bread.
Sounds like a very cool trip. Wonder how a church like Glide grows to that size and supports the ministries it does. Very cool trip.
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