Economics and Hospitality

My brother-in-law is a very conservative guy - politically speaking. A while back several of us were having a discussion about the spike in homelessness that Tacoma is currently seeing. My brother-in-law interjected that homelessness was a result of laziness and a lack of creativity on the part of the homeless. There was a stunned silence among those of us previously in the discussion that anyone would espouse this opinion. Yet, in spite of our disapproval of this idea, it is one that persists in our culture. Clearly homelessness, and poverty in general, are multifaceted problems and any attempt to minimize them to a single source is naive at best.

The question of the source of poverty is one that is only briefly covered by Polanyi, but a topic that should be covered in any reading on the history of economic development. It is said that history is written by the victors and this is true of economic history as well. Too often those who lack power are forgotten in the malaise of excitement around the successes of the system. Polanyi points out that during the period covered in his book that the question to the source of poverty was generally answered by saying that poverty was a necessary result of the successes of the system.¹ Poverty was essentially the collateral damage of having a successful economy.

During the manufacturing successes of the eighteenth century in England, John Wesley set out to set up ministries to help those in need. Often those in need would be the infermed or elderly. One such ministry was homes for widows and those who could not provide for themselves. An important part of the ministry was having four or five Methodist preachers and others in the community dine with the members of these households every week in order to help the residents maintain connection with the Methodist community.² Wesley also instituted “Love Feasts” where members of the small groups would regularly gather to share a meal together and he encouraged them to gather with the poor and needy to help with their needs.

Much like Wesley’s era there are many in our communities that are falling through the cracks of a system that is built to support those who can support themselves. Now is the time to start creatively seeking to build ministries that are able to better support those in need. This is not to say that there are not already many hospitality ministries that are doing incredible work, but rather to say that there are other creative solutions to be found.

As stated earlier, poverty is a multifaceted problem. This means that there are many areas of potential success can be found. The traditional areas of food and shelter are needed, for sure, but there are also less explored areas like vocational retraining and communal support. For instance in Tacoma we have the Tacoma Housing Network, which provides housing for families when sudden unemployment and homelessness happens. It also provides job training and budgeting lessons to the parent(s) in order to help them find work again and eventually a place where they can live. Several churches in area participate by open their buildings to the network for a week every few months as a home to the participants. The members of the churches provide meals, entertainment, and community. Another interesting solution is a foster licensing organization in the area that provides what they call ‘pre-foster’ placements for children while their parents get back on their feet, with the assistance of other organizations, after losing their job or illness. This helps to keep the children out of the system and a blemish off of the parents record. These are but a couple creative methods for helping those in need. People more creative than I am will be able to find other solutions if we allow them to be creative with the solutions.

It is great when the economy booms, but the need does not go away, it is only more obscured. As followers of Christ we need to be aware of this reality and lean into the opportunities to provide hospitality to those in need.