Seminar 'Option for the Poor'

Andrea Tafferner: Learning Project "Option for the Poor"
Petra Schlüter: Which Value Has the "Meeting" in the Work With Homeless Persons?
Petra Winters: Some Considerations About the Meaning of Spirituality in the Homeless Assistance
Beate Kuhl: Homeless Persons - People Like I And You
Anna Stern: Seminar "Option for the Poor"

Thus "equipped" we - everybody for her/himself - went on the second day through the streets of Münster like the other participants in the street retreat in Berlin: "The participants look for a place in the city, e.g. among homeless people or drug addicts, in a Turkish café or in a mosque/church, at the execution place Plötzensee or the Soviet honour monument in Treptow. Where they feel curiosity they take off their shoes and begin with a time of attention. They notice the environment and their own feelings therein, and divine slowly why they have 'chosen' just this place. Perhaps the participant did till now avoid the people or questions of this place. Prejudices, injuries and fears in one's life history or many other things can be the causes to be led there by one's heart. Sometimes tears will come or other feelings. Then it is good to stay at this place, and even to return soon there, in order to take off one's shoes again." (Christian Herwartz: To Practice Looking and Listening Respectfully on the Street, 24.02.2004)

The decisive thing of this second day was after all the "return rounds". In small groups we told each other what we had seen and noticed, where we took off our shoes (at least internally), and where God had talked with us. By telling and expressing, by listening to other participants became clear how much self-knowledge can happen in such retreats. Such a knowledge of one's limitations could be e.g., how I co-operate in the exclusion of homeless people, or how a depressed painful experience has hardened me, or how thin actually the wall is between me and psychologically ill people. Self-knowledge occurred thereby often in meetings with foreign people, with allegedly "weaker" people. There then happened just that which Martin Buber described as mutuality in relations: The "weaker" human beings became the teachers.

Social exclusion can eventually be overcome by direct personal contact only. That does not mean for the professional relation organization at all that the existing imbalance in the relationship does no longer play any role. Usually the social worker does not have these problems (homelessness, unemployment, drug addiction etc.). But a meeting on the human level knows about the basic needs of each individual, no matter in which situation she/he just is.

Who realizes in his life the option for the poor gives witness for the God of the Bible, who took his stand on the side of the poor, and for Jesus Christ, who identified himself with the hungry and thirsty, with foreigners, homeless, naked and ill people, and with prisoners (Mt 25, 31-46). The "option for the poor" is thus a constant challenge for a professional social work with Christian profile.

During my four week practical course in Berlin-Kreuzberg my predominant work took place in the emergency overnight accommodation of the parish of Our Lady. Here each evening ten men could find a sleeping place. There was common dinner and the remaining evening was arranged freely; one played parlour games, one talked with each other, and some men withdrew also early to their beds.

Further employment places were the soup kitchen of Our Lady's parish and the Café Krause of the St Thomas parish. I will refer in my report also to these institutions.

"Real" Meeting

The most important topic concerning my practical course with homeless persons was for me the "real" meeting with human beings. Put into the proper mood by the contact seminar "Option for the Poor" I approached particularly sensitive the meetings with homeless people, and I realized how substantial and important this point is. It is not only about the first "hello", but quite generally about the questions: "How does one meet men? How does a relationship arise from that?" and: "Which meaning has this meeting?"

I will begin by telling my impressions from the contact seminar, and will describe how this seminar has prepared me for the time in Berlin. Then I will deal with a part of the concept of that institution, and the experienced ways of acting of the co-workers on-the-spot in regard to the topic "meeting", and I will give an account of my own experiences in dealing with men. Finally it will be about the question why just the "true" meeting is important for the area of the homeless assistance, but also quite generally for the later work within the social area.

Impulses from the "retreat on the street"
The preparation time for our practical course consisted in a one-week seminar "Option for the Poor". By the "retreat on the street", which took place in this week and was guided by Christian Herwartz (a worker priest from Kreuzberg), I became aware how important something wholly different from the pure fact knowledge about homelessness can be, namely the human level of the relationship. By means of the parable of the burning thorn shrub from the Bible (see Ex 3:1-6) we were asked to take off our shoes - figuratively spoken - and to take our stand at the same level with people whom we would meet during the day in the city by our "retreat". And which that actually means to be on the same level, this is the important question. It says much more than not to behave like a "social worker", who already knows the things that are good and right for other people.

With the contact seminar I had set as most important aim for my practical course: to meet people just as human beings, and not as merely "homeless persons", and to be just a man and not a "beginning social worker". By this approach I made very positive experiences and got certainly a wholly different access to people as it had been possible for me otherwise. Of course, due to my trainee status, this was also easier for me as for the permanently employed co-workers on-the-spot.

"What Then Is Here To Be Studied?"
What now does the conception of Our Lady's emergency overnight accommodation intend in regard to the meeting with human beings? There is said:

"All homeless people are treated equally, independent of nation, culture, and religion. We know ourselves fundamentally obligated to a critical dialogical pedagogy, which has in view also the perspective of the homeless people."

Here it is first about the equal treatment of all people in the sense of our Fundamental Law, article 3 ("all men are equal before the law. Nobody may be disadvantaged or preferred because of her/his sex, descent, race, language, homeland and origin, faith, and religious or political opinions"). Further an important point takes effect: The perspective of the homeless person is included. It is thus not the task of the person who attends to a homeless person to determine what should be done, and what was the best. Talk is offered and we discussed together the things which are important for the homeless person and the question where she/he needs assistance; whereby at the same time the differences between the social worker and the homeless person are naturally also there - due to the situation.

In practice my experience was that the men who had a sleep place in the emergency overnight accommodation were met as equals by those who attended them. Naturally the pedagogue is the finally responsible person for the smooth run, but I never experienced that somebody, figuratively spoken, had generally placed her/himself above the homeless people.

It was an equal side by side, and the needs and problems of the men were always noticed. The table was laid by the men independently, the planning for the rinsing service were negotiated, in the process of the evening all sat together at the tables, playing games or talking together. There were definitely meetings that were more than "care". The other man was looked at, addressed, taken seriously...

The homeless people showed themselves particularly sensitive in the approach to people of whom they believed they would look down upon them or not respect them any longer as human beings. "What is here that can be studied?" for example G. said to me. "We are not study objects, we too are men like you", was for me the message behind it. Here became completely clear what the homeless people wish themselves: To be accepted as man, and that means as subject, and not as object.

To Be Able To Listen

The problem which is also to be seen behind it is certainly the small 'Ego' (self-confidence) of people on the street. They had often lost their stay in life, and felt as failures - this became clear to me in many discussions. There were made remarks about oneself, as e.g., "It was hard for me to place me there, and to sell the homeless persons' newspaper." or, "Well, look at me, I am finished ...". Some showed themselves rather very reserved or reservedly and told nothing about themselves, but talked about general things.

To get a personal contact it is above all important to let your vis-à-vis tell, and to listen well. If you meet the other person truly, honestly and acceptingly, then you will create confidence, and out of the first meeting a relationship can slowly arise. I got just recently a message from A. (an inhabitant of the emergency overnight accommodation at that time), who wrote me he had found now a firm shelter, and he asked if I would come to Berlin again. This was for me the best confirmation that he felt really accepted as man by me. In Berlin I have let me led by him through his homeland quarter; he did it with great joy. In this way we could come well at one eye level, because he was no longer in the role of the homeless person only, but could me show something that I did not know, and thereby he has told me a lot about himself.

On the other hand it is also quite important that one does not make promises which one cannot keep, respectively offers a relationship that cannot be held or is not wanted so at all. It belongs to transparency and reliability of relations that I make clear my borders. Otherwise it might come to disappointments, because by my behaviour I have waked hopes for a closer contact, which I cannot offer in my role as a social female worker. This is not always easy, because just in the social work borders can dissolve easily and quickly. The more important is it to have this problem in the back of your head, when you build up relations.

Partnership Instead of Alms

In other employment places of my practical course I made likewise impressive experiences with the topic of the meeting on the same eye level.

In the soup kitchen of Our Lady's parish for example, where the meal was prepared together in the morning, and was distributed in the afternoon to everyone who stood hungry before the door. Here everyone was equal to the other: One sat down at a table, talked with each other and respected the mutual differences, everyone could contribute according to her/his abilities. There I sat beside the mentally ill Mrs. N., the trainees of the educator training, the homeless person "Omi" (grandma), and the Englishwoman who simply wanted to help. It was a place of an equal meeting, which was not bound by language, origin or status. There vegetables for the soup were prepared together; one talked with each other or was silent, just as it corresponded to one's mood.

Into the Café Krause, a breakfast café of the St Thomas parish, everybody could come who was hungry or looking for society only, to get breakfast or a talk. It was so organized that the co-workers were mostly in the actual kitchen, where they poured out coffee and soup, and did the table-ware. The guests sat in the dining-room and talked. As a woman employee in the kitchen I felt higher than the guests. By my role as "giver" (subject) the visitors got automatically the role of the receiving (object), and it was no longer possible to be together as equals. Here the meeting on the "same eye level" was difficult for me. Such an meeting could only take place when I sat down by the visitors at the breakfast table. I think, by more inclusion of the guests into the run of the café (e.g. to cook coffee, to warm up the soup, to help oneself independently, to help with the washing-up, etc.), a more equivalent structure could be created, which would not give the guests so much the feeling of "alms people", but would take them into view as whole men that can also contribute something to the relationship.

In an article of the magazine "Social Psychiatric Information", in which it is about the reintegration from homeless people by 'cared for living', the problem of the subject-object-relationship is described likewise. One pleads there for the abolition of role pictures like being superior and being subordinated, and demands an accepting, partnership-like organization of the interaction process, so that the relationship between social workers and homeless people can turn out positively, and from there positive developments become possible.
(see Reichertz 1999, P. 9)

To Address with Name

The first meeting is, according to my opinion, very decisive for the further development of the relationship, and thus for the chance of success of an assistance. If I as social worker do not succeed in it by the first contact in really meeting the other man, and in giving her/him a feeling of being accepted, in listening to him, in meeting him with openness, then it can happen that she/he will no longer look for further contacts, and so the help will end before it began. Martin Buber (a Jewish religion philosopher) writes in his book "I and You" just about that true meeting which can take place between human beings, and is so important. "The one who says 'you', h a s  not something as object ... The one who says 'you', has not something, has nothing. But she/he stands in a relationship." (Buber 2002, S. 4f)

What Buber means here is that you have to see your vis-à-vis as a whole being, not as something (hence not as "object"), but as this special human being that is there in front of you with her/his special requests. To notice her/him and show interest in her/him, that is the point of the meeting, of the relationship. To dwell on the example of the homeless people: It is not enough for a real meeting to assign to a homeless person a sleep place and to explain the rules of the accommodation. That is by no means a meeting yet. Only in the contact, in talking and listening, in replying and in being-wholly-there for the other person, will real meeting develop. There it is important to look into the eyes of the other person, to address her/him by her/his name, and to ask for her/his longings and needs. This is congruent with the experiences of Joachim Ritzkowsky:

"By our exchange of experiences it became clear to us that for homeless people the lack of human relations is at least just as serious as the lack of food, clothes, and dwelling ... just as important as dwellings are human beings." (Ritzkowsky 2001, P. 26) "What the homeless people whom I got to know just as urgently needed as money, were words and an open ear, was the readiness not to regard them only as receivers of help, were spirit and solidarity." (On the same place P. 48)

That it is, according to my opinion, which is at stake in the work with homeless people, and with all in the social work: To treat other people as human beings, to meet them as individuals, to understand them not only as objects of the social work to which has to be given help. This implies to look into the eyes of the other person on the same level; to arrange the relationship as partnership, and not hierarchically; to see her/him simply as man - as I myself am also simply a man; to be open and honest, not to play a part; to become really aware of my vis-à-vis, to listen to her/him really, and not only to remain on the surface. To address other people by their names is likewise very important, because it shows that I am concerned about exactly this person - you are meant personally, and not anybody.

Not to deny the "client" her/his dignity of man but on the contrary: to return it to her/him by the human meeting and by shaping the relationship, that is for me a aim in the social work which may never be lost sight of, with all the assistance planning and other formulations of the aim. Because just this dignity of the human person, and this human relationship are the basis, in order to be able to work with needy people. I think, someone who does not feel wholly accepted as man will not allow to be assisted, and will not co-operate effectively with a social worker. Hence each social worker should be also simply man, and as such meet the client and make possible for her/him the "real meeting", which should time and again happen anew, in order to create a good, sound basis for the common work.

Literature:

Buber, Martin (2002): Ich und Du, Stuttgart. Konzeption der Notübernachtung (Sommernachtscafe) der Gemeinde St. Marien-Liebfrauen.

Reichertz, Uwe (1999): Betreutes Wohnen im Netzwerk als Alternative heißt: das Rad nicht neu erfinden zu müssen, in: Sozialpsychiatrische Informationen, Jahrgang 29, Heft 3, S. 8-10

Ritzkowsky, Joachim (2001): Die Spinne auf der Haut. Berlin

Literature:
Buber, Martin (2002): I and you, Stuttgart. Conception of the emergency overnight accommodation (summer night cafe) of the parish St. Mary
Reichertz, Uwe (1999): Cared for living in the network as alternative means: to have not to invent the wheel again, in: Social psychiatric information, class 29, number 3, P. 8-10
Ritzkowsky, Joachim (2001): The spider on the skin. Berlin

When we started our learning project "Option for the Poor" in November 2003, I had no experiences with homeless persons. The guided seminar began with a block meeting, to which I went with little foreknowledge. At the beginning of February the time had come. It was very exciting for me to become acquainted with the other participants: predominantly Religious Sisters and Brothers from all parts of Germany and neighbouring foreign countries. Most of them had gathered experiences in the area of social assistance for the homeless for many years. One participant inspired me just on the first day to thinking: Father Christian Herwartz. He provoked us students directly at the beginning by his honest, belligerent, offensive way of calling just unpleasant things by their name, and told us about his life, which is filled with solidarity with the poor and excluded. He asked us whether it was enough when a social worker, supplied with concepts and theories, went with vocational distance to people in emergency. He did not speak of clients, because for him it is a different kind of relationship which he shares with people in emergency: equality without distance, which is based on the same level before God. The discussions with Christian Herwartz and my intensive experiences with the "street retreat" led to a better sympathizing with his kind of a lived faith. These were the decisive points for me to grapple with my own faith, with my fears and my conceptions. I wanted to use the time of this practical course to get a clear idea of the professional social work, and to find my own point of view to which extent spirituality can find a place in everyday life of a social female worker, whose work is shaped by theories and professionalism.

My Experiences with Spirituality

To write about spirituality is a difficult venture. Particularly since one could limit it here to a female spirituality. This treatise about spirituality has to be understood in the broadest sense. I would like to state it as a personal starting point of thought, and know about the difficulty to verify it scientifically. Benedikta Hintersberger writes in her contribution "Elements and Structures of Female Spirituality" about this difficulty: "Questions about the own spirituality can only be answered by reflecting one's own experiences, and so rather in an existential aphoristic way." {1} Hence spirituality is a personal experience.

A further approach was the attendance of the seminar "Spiritual Dimensions for Social Female Workers and Social Workers - Ways for the Untrained" from Professor Veronica Kircher. In my contribution aspects from this seminar are contained. In addition I made experiences in a stationary hospice, where it is, just at the end of life, much more natural to talk about God, one's own faith, and spiritual experiences. It seems that there borders can fall, which in everyday life are taken as taboo.

My Experiences in the Women Meeting-Place

In the four weeks as trainee in the women meeting-place I could get some impressions of the work of social pedagogues / social woman workers. Also many important principles were explained to me, which concern explicitly homeless women who are living in difficult situations. These women need a "woman area" that offers protection, intimacy, dignity, self-sufficiency, and possibilities to communicate, and can only be led by professionally trained women. Public areas are often man domains, which have a threatening effect on violence-experienced women. There I met an emergency which showed itself in many different forms: drug problems, mental illnesses, missing or insufficient occupation training, sexual exploitation, and exploitation by giving away the last money because of the threat of a latent homelessness.

The women often told of their economic and vocational problems. But I became aware thereby that often inter-human relation problems play a substantially larger role. For this I would like to describe two case examples: A woman called several times on the day the office of the woman meeting-place and required always to talk with the same social pedagogue. It turned out that this woman lived in another city together with a man, but was known to the social female worker from the scene in Münster. This woman had great fear of that man, and felt unable to accept the offer to fetch a ticket in the social welfare office there, and to come to Münster. Despite the chance of familiarity and assistance in Münster it was impossible for her. In many telephone calls the social female worker tried time and again to motivate that woman. It reminded me of the pastoral care by telephone by which one needs much patience and an infinitely long breath. Besides, there was spun by telephone an auxiliary net that this woman could be accepted also directly by a stationary institution.

Another example was a woman who was carefully persuaded by the visiting social female worker to come along to the women meeting-place. She wore only a coat, and was in a bad physical condition, which showed traces of violence. After the woman had showered, got new clothes, and eaten something, she asked to be brought back to the man with whom she lived together - back to violence.

By these examples I experienced how difficult it is to give to these women an assistance that will bring them ahead. There are relation patterns, used for many years, from which those women cannot escape. In many discussions with the engaged social female workers I learned that there are no large rescue actions in the woman homeless assistance, but often moments and small steps of success.

Uta Enders-Dragässer and Brigitte Sellach write to this topic, "homeless women fasten their estimation of the situation on the relation level ..., and from there they will decide how they behave, and how they will act. Therefore can be assumed that particularly on the interaction level is decided whether women who are looking for assistance are discouraged or encouraged in the acceptance of support offers, and in the pursuit of their legal claims to assistance."{2} Here the high requirement of the social work becomes clear. A social female worker has to approach the clients directly, and at the same tine she has to find her way in larger social structures, and must not shrink from conflicts. Each individual relationship has to be strengthened differently. Thereby each day nearness and distance, setting of borders, reliability, influence with simultaneous acknowledgment of the personality rights of each individual will always anew play a crucial role. Hereby time and again extreme situations arise, in which one has to bear great pain and meets one's limits.

Spirituality in the Homeless Assistance

I tie up my thoughts about spirituality at this point.
Professional social work can be regarded as sufficient and meaningful. But if somebody has her/his own spiritual experiences, it is natural that she/he includes them in her/his thoughts and feelings. Here a faithful Christian, even if she/he is professionally trained, is always confronted with the command to love her/his neighbour.
Spirituality in a broad sense is possible for everybody, also for people who do not believe: meetings with nature, in border situations, or in interhuman relations. It happened already to many people that they experienced a moment of deep joy and gratitude. Mrs. Kircher says about it: "Spiritual experiences have always to do with the 'core of our person', our 'heart'. Therefore it is difficult to express them by words, and they can be understood by our intellect in first beginnings only."

If one summarizes spirituality in a closer sense, hence in the original sense, there are two ways. For me this "inward" way to the centre of our person symbolizes faith. Meditations and prayers are doors to this area. The "outward way" is expressed by social or political commitment, ethical principles, responsible dealing with nature, and in the love of one's neighbour.

"Also Christian spirituality has to be seen in this context. It is carried and shaped by the faith in Jesus Christ and in his saving message. Faith is spiritual, if it is not taken over outwardly, but is lived and shaped from inside." These two sentences from the seminar of Mrs. Kircher are important basic statements about faith and spirituality. For only when I have an internal familiarity with and certitude about the existence of my faith, only then I am able to live it also, to communicate it and to act convincingly.

In the social assistance for the homeless much empathy and transparency is needed. There men have lost their confidence, have experienced infinitely much wrong, and feel excluded. To enter into contact with them I have to know myself, and to be in constant contact with myself. I have to be authentic, open and free for sensitive meetings. To achieve this is not an easy way. "Love your neighbour as yourself." On the second view this is a high demand, because I have to be in agreement with myself, have to bear fears, errors, and self-criticism. If I argue spiritually with me, I will experience new sides on me. Herman Andriessen writes about an "open relationship to the shadow". He describes the search for the dark and cramped in us as chance of a new perception. By it experience will become "freer of purpose and intention" {3}. There is needed a whole set of own experiences, many are often painful. We are inclined to depress unpleasant things. Andriessen describes the possibility that human beings will, by digesting their shadow, discover a depth which goes beyond the everyday life, and makes them thus sensitive for the internal creative forces of others. This is an important foundation in each relation work. This maturing process is described also by Christian Herwartz. He sees in the story of the burning thorn shrub and in God's request of Moses to take off his shoes an example to face reality, to give up escape possibilities, and not to tower above other people. "And therefore we have also to take off the shoes of the know-all, in order to become which we actually are: Children of God - and sisters and brothers of the mankind family." {4} We have to place ourselves on one and the same level, have to experience our own history again, and to face reality. This new clarity means also at once fewer strategy and masking tactics from fear of conflicts. Spirituality is the search for the sense of life, and is the evidence of our courage to take responsibility. And at the same time it gives comfort.

Those who work in the social assistance for the homeless will reach the limits of human understanding of justice. In spirituality I see a possibility for the social worker to gain strength and peace. There is much comfort in it to hand over to some higher being that part of responsibility which can overcharge man. Often I have no answer to the sense question: why human beings have to suffer. Without this thought I was not able to do my honorary activity in the hospice. Here I see clear parallels to the social assistance for the homeless, where it is necessary to bear wrongs. I would not like that spirituality is misunderstood as naive optimism. A professional social worker has to protect her/himself by demarcation. Spirituality offers here a possibility to digest the experienced things, and a source of strength.

A further principle is the inclusion of spiritual thoughts: I meet my fellow humens, nature, and me with more respect, act more deliberately, and am open for global interests.

Concluding Remark

The four weeks as trainee in the woman meeting-place of the Gertrude House gave me a good impression of the work of a social female worker. Social work is indispensable, and renders multilayered help. Where people meet there will always be simultaneously room for inter-human relations too. Spirituality is one of them. I was impressed by the friendly, pleasant atmosphere in the women meeting-place. The social pedagogues convey acceptance and friendliness. As a result of the 'low threshold' (one meets at same eye level) there arise difficult moments where one has to react correctly and carefully. The first moments are crucial for the further contact. The constant awareness for the right moment to offer a talk, and to bring the client's conception in conformity with the situation, requires high professional competence. Demarcation too - as protection from excessive stress - is professional. The interlocking of the assistance system can only take place professionally. Nevertheless the spiritual way of thinking found a place in me. It offers possibilities to me to develop further, to be self-critical, to find comfort, and to refuel strength. The core thought pleases me: to meet human beings and nature with respect. I think spirituality can find a place in the social work by its ability to increase one's own competence, and to become more sensitive. People like Christian Herwartz do an important pastoral work but they cannot replace the professional social work. A pastoral offer explicitly for homeless women can do an important work. Here again it is necessary to set up the room for a pastoral that does justice to women in a church shaped by men.

Notes

{1} Hintersberger 20.
{2} Enders Dragaesser,/Sellach 27f.
{3} Andriessen 125f.
{4} Herwartz, Christian: Retreats on the Street , 27.07.2004

Literature:

Andriessen, Herman: Der Sehnsucht in mir einen Namen geben. Lebensweg und Spiritualität, Mainz 1993.

Enders-Dragässer, Uta/ Sellach, Brigitte: Handlungsleitende Grundprinzipien für frauengerechte Angebote in der Wohnungslosenhilfe, in: Materialien zur Wohnungslosenhilfe Heft 34, Bielefeld 1997.

Herwartz, Christian: Exerzitien auf der Straße (27.07.2004)

Hintersberger, Benedikta:Elemente und Strukturformen weiblicher Spiritualität, in: Stefanie Spendel (Hg.),Weibliche Spiritualität im Christentum, Regensburg 1996, 20-33.

Literature:
Andriessen, Herman: To give a name to the longing in me. Life and spirituality, Mainz 1993.
Enders Dragaesser, Uta/Sellach, Brigitte: Action-leading basic principles for woman-fair offers in the homeless assistance, in: Materials to the homeless assistance number 34, Bielefeld 1997.
Herwartz, Christian: Exerzitien on the Street (27.07.2004)
Hintersberger, Benedikta: Elements and structures of female spirituality, in: Stefanie Spendel (Hg.), Female spirituality in Christianity, Regensburg 1996, 20-33.

Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

If one goes with open eyes through Münster one will see them at many places. Beggars before the churches, at the Prinzipal market, in the pedestrian precinct, etc ... They belong already so to the picture of the city that many do not notice them any longer. - Or does the normal citizen not want to notice this indication of poverty in the society, because it does not fit in her/his picture of our society? The question about poverty is depressed by us to a large extent. As long as one is not concerned, one will overlook it. That applies at least to the majority of the population.

Add to it that cities and municipalities do since some years everything to keep far such unwanted figures from the townscape. The controls of identification documents are increased, the long-term stay in stations is forbidden. The order guardians are quick with place banishments and house prohibitions. Hence the question arises: By which right? - Are homeless people less worth? One needs to regard only once the bus stops by us. In former times there was a simple bank. Today there are without exception individual seats or short banks on which two people can sit, then a bar, and then two seats again. Why this new arrangement? - Probably, that no "bum" can spend the night here. In former times there was a bank in the station hall in Münster on which one could rest. This bank was removed without substitution. Only after some travellers complained, new seats were set up. - Single seats, directly before the customer service window. I could endlessly continue the series of examples. There are systematically taken away from the homeless persons their traditional meeting places. The new clean cities must be attractive for tourists, and financially strong visitors. Here is no longer place for the homeless and beggars. Hence it is no miracle that this form of poverty disappeared from the field of vision of many people. But it is nevertheless still there.

One should time and again call back to mind: Those people are exactly the same human beings like you and I. Everyone has her/his own history, her/his own career. None is a "bum" by birth, a "tramp", or however they are called. Behind those quite disparaging names are hidden most different life stories. But common to all is one thing: They did not have it easy in their lives. For when someone is living on the street, then s/he has already fallen through most of the stages of our social net. Most people are not in a rush "without firm domicile". There has happened already a lot before in a life, until someone lands so far down. Mostly homelessness is only the result of many other problems: no job, many homeless ones are alcohol or drug dependent, and by a majority of them there is added still a mental illness.

And with these people, who are "completely down", I had to do in my practical course in Maria Veen. The worker colony Maria Veen is a stationary institution of the homeless assistance. When I heard the first time of Maria Veen, I was nevertheless quite sceptical. In my imagination I sketched a place to which the homeless and alcoholics were sent off from the cities - as far as possible away from any larger city. There "they" can do then whatever they want. - Out of sight - out of mind. The reality surprised me then nevertheless very much.

Maria Veen - a Worker Colony

To begin with it is important that nobody is forced to stay in the worker colony. Everybody is voluntarily there, and those who are not pleased with it can always leave. I experienced also this: An older man came into the overnight accommodation. It ensued that he would probably remain gladly. Heaven and earth were moved, and the admission was prepared. After three days he had disappeared, all efforts had been in vain. There are also such cases.

Maria Veen is a worker colony. Who wants to remain has also to work - as far as he is able to do it, and is not in the pension age yet. The work is adapted to the possibilities of the individual. Priority has not the performance, as on the free job market, but sense and purpose of the exercise is to give the day a structure. One could call it also a therapeutic measure. Many inhabitants did already for a long time no regulated work, and it is already a success to get accustomed again to a regulated routine of the day. Thus by the work also the 'Ego' is strengthened. Even if the aplomb of some clients does often not suggest that they have problems with their 'Ego'. The pretension attitude is often enormous. "I have a right to it ..." This behaviour is possibly sometimes the attempt of compensation. One tries to disguise the feeling of one's own inferiority, and to attain some self-maintenance. The more it is important to represent on the one side one's own position clearly, but also to be conscious of the situation of the other person.

Often little things will suddenly play a big role. Thus I found it very interesting to observe, how important it was for most people to be possibly greeted by their names, if one met them on the way. A simple "good morning Mr. ..." indicates to the greeted: There someone knows me. There someone notices me. It has not at all always to be a long talk, for which is often also not enough time, but a simple greeting and perhaps a few words mean already much, if they are said to someone who did not experience much appreciation in her/his life. On the street they are mostly ignored, if not despised, by the working population. The experience to be despised is probably a continuous companion of many homeless persons. It was connected with their social descent, when they lost work and dwelling, when they became alcohol dependent, and the relations and friendships were broken up. Nobody can bear it well to be despised. Often the reaction then is to meet now others with contempt, or at least to pretend it. The degrading experience to live on the street becomes now the fantastic Live Event. "I can go where I want.", "Why am I to work? - the social welfare office pays nevertheless everything!", "Golly! You are all Philistines. "... The life on the street is stylized up to the measure of all things. You can observe that by many homeless people. Actually it is only a preventive measure, but it functions for a while. As long as the own situation is the best which ever happened to me, I do not need to tackle with my failures. To the largest part the men who I met in Maria Veen had already left this stage behind them. For those who go into a stationary institution want to leave the street behind and also admit the fact that this kind of life is not very worthwhile.

To Overcome Anonymity

During the course I took part in the funeral of two inhabitants of the home for the elderly, who both had lived in the colony before they came into the home for the aged. There was a mourning service in the private chapel, in which some of the inmates and also some co-workers from Maria Veen took part. Here we were quite concretely reminded of the two deceased. To the cemetery only a few people came along. But here too the minister said some words about the deceased. Subsequently one met in the home for the aged to the coffee. - Just a completely normal funeral, as you can experience it also at home in your own parish - but nevertheless something special. Here the dignity of man is underlined once more. That he/she has been someone who had lived for years with us. It was a very personal parting. There was nothing of the anonymity with which many homeless are buried elsewhere. One thing however was very typical: There were no next of kin - nobody from the family of the deceased. Here becomes clear: Homeless persons have almost never a family. By that I do not mean that there are not somewhere brothers and sisters, wife, children, or other relationship yet. But in most cases there is no longer any contact to them. Many homeless persons have broken off head over heals the relations with their social net. This then has had the most different reasons - fancied or real ones. By almost all of them it was probably some act of despair, because they could no longer endure their past environment. Here too one may not forget that many homeless are also mentally ill. Sometimes it has been also the family, which broke off the contact, because by an alcoholic or mentally unstable member sometime the burden can become intolerable. That is not to be interpreted now as criticism of the family. Sometimes simply no other reaction than the breaking off of all relations is possible yet. If the contact broke off once, then it is difficult to re-establish it. The initiative for this would have to come from the homeless her/himself, but that is a very large step, by which one would have to tackle first of all one's own biography. This analysis, and the possibility to be perhaps rejected (because it is by no means sure that the other side does wish the contact at all - the injuries are often too large), let probably many shrink back from undertaking such an attempt.

If you approach in Münster the station, then you will already see from afar a group of young homeless who are sitting on the place in front of the station. Beer bottles circle, and a loud discussion takes place. This picture is surely known to many people. Solidarity is important for the surviving. In larger cities one can often observe these communities of fate. I know that also from my native place: There too are places where "the bums meet to drink", as some fellow citizens call it. Hence probably my picture which I had in former times: For those people community is important. One sticks together against everything that comes from the outside. And I was to some extent surprised then in the practical course that many inhabitants spent their leisure time dearest alone in their rooms or somewhere outside. Groups which do something together one sees only rarely.

Concluding Remark

I have presented now some things which may apply to some homeless, but I would not like to generalize that actually. Because one thing should be clear: Whether people with or without dwelling, each man is a person completely for her/himself. It may be that the one or other fits well into a cliché, but those who think only in clichés will soon lose sight of the individual.

In the contact seminar "Option for the Poor" we talked about the fact, whether it made perhaps sense to place oneself with the clients on the same stage. I tried it and I must say, I regard it as impossible for me. Not, because I mean to stand on a much higher stage, certainly not. But as trainee in the social service I stood on a different stage. I belonged just to the social service, and not to the clients. That is simply a difference, and for a helping relationship distance is necessary.

There is still another reason why I consider it impossible for me to place me on the same stage with the inhabitants: I think that each man has a bit his own stage. Simply by the different life experiences that everyone made. It is simply so: We are not at all identical. Each man is unique. Eventually it is about the attitude of respect for the other person.

Literatur:

Walter Hermann (Hrsg): Materialien zur Wohnungslosenhilfe Heft 46 (2001): Lebens(T)räume zurückgewinnen, mitgestalten, VSH Verlag Soziale Hilfe, Bielefeld 2001

Literature:
Walter Hermann (Hrsg): Materials to the homeless assistance number 46 (2001): Life rooms/(d)reams recover, co-design, VSH Publishing House Social Assistance, Bielefeld 2001

This country wide contact seminar of religious sisters and brothers took place for the sixteenth time at the Münster department of the KFH NW (Catholic Technical Colleg Nordrhein Westfalen)

In this year the meeting stood under the slogan "Spirituality for the Service among the Poor". Beside thirty five nuns and monks from all over Germany also fifteen students of the KFH were occupied one week with the situation of excluded people, and one's own attitude with working and having social intercourse with those people. The contact seminar, for years now already well attended, serves above all for linking and support. Many nuns and monks who decided on living together with the poor outside of their monasteries are by that decision first set back on themselves. The common week in Münster offers them the possibility of exchanging with like-minded people, and of experiencing a spiritual support for the work, which often wears out their strengths and nerves.

The Street as "Holy Ground"

The word "option" originally means "free will, free choice". The motto "Option for the Poor" stands for the conscious decision to place oneself at the side of the poor, wholly in the sense of the Latin American liberation theology which coined this expression. On the first three seminar days the participants experienced this still in the shelter of the technical college. Apart from a Bible discussion Bishop Josef Voss discussed with the participants the situation of people who are living illegally in Germany, and who are underpaid, or just not paid at all, for their work in private households, in the catering trade or on the building sites. The Jesuit Christian Herwartz from Berlin finally invited to an unusual form of Spiritual Exercises. After an intensive preparation the participants set out alone for one day on the streets of Münster, and opened for a personal meeting with excluded people. "An old homeless woman asked me to coffee", told me a participant ashamed. "Even the little she had, she still shared." The very realistic experience outside of the used role and environment brought for many of us a deeply moving, sometimes painful self-knowledge. The concrete model for this action Herwartz quoted from the Bible. Moses became curious and wanted to regard more closely a burning thorn shrub, until he was asked by God to take off his shoes because "you stand on holy ground." For the Jesuit the burning shrub is the often thorny reality. To take off the shoes means to lay down the own distance in uncomfortable, threatening and painful encounters with excluded people and their reality. The holy ground is the street itself.

"Next Time I Will Participate Voluntarily"

This time the event had been a part of their obligatory program, said a student in the review on Friday, but next time she would take part "voluntarily". She had experienced this week as mental "filling station". There could be heard terms like "view of life", and "self identification process". For a young Sister stood in the centre "to meet engaged, strong people". But time and again the conversation turned upon the experiences which the participants had made during the retreat day. "By that I became aware for the first time of the distance which I have to the poor", said another Sister critically.

Wanted Topic: Proximity and Distance

For the conclusion on Friday noon there remained still time for suggestions and wishes to the leading team, the lecturers Josef Elberg and Andrea Tafferner, Father Erich Purk and Ursula Adams, initiator of the seminar. In the large round the suggestion met with approval to work in the next seminar at the topic "Proximity and Distance". Just for the participating students it might be an important question: how can I connect professional distance, time and again demanded in the studies, with emotional proximity to my clients in my later vocational everyday life. Because, so Herwartz provocatively, "Distance is important for the professional, for man it is poison."

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