New Orleans Prayer Guide [Homeless]…

November 18, 2007 | 12:47 AM

There was a big gathering of New Orleans’ homeless in front of City Hall Saturday.  I usually catch some of the local news every day, but I’ll be the first to say I didn’t hear anything about this until I came across the article on CBS News.  Maybe because it was an election weekend, we just didn’t cover it much.  More likely, I just didn’t watch enough news to know.  But I do know, and so I’m reminded that this is another big prayer need.

Before Katrina we had a lot of homeless folks.  The population probably wasn’t larger or smaller than any other normal city in the US.  The CBS article (read the whole thing here) says, “New Orleans has 12,000 homeless people, up from 6,300 before Katrina, according to UNITY of Greater New Orleans, a group that helps the homeless.” When I came back from my Katrina exile, I was told there weren’t a lot of homeless in town because, generally speaking, nobody had any sympathy- everybody was homeless.  I can’t say what percentage of our now 12,000 homeless were among the 6,300 pre-Katrina homeless.  It’d be interesting to know, but probably not terribly important in the long run.

Statistics are always interesting to someone, but interesting doesn’t get people off the streets and into homes.  And it’s getting cooler here now.  Winter in New Orleans isn’t easy.  Sure, we’re practically living in a tropical climate.  Sure, it’s going to be in the mid-70s for Thanksgiving Week.  But it’ll be getting into the 50s at night.  Hear me when I say this: the humidity during the summer makes us live in a sauna; the humidity during the winter is like walking into a cold bath.  It’s brutal for the homeless.

So take a moment now and pray for the 12,000 homeless in New Orleans.  And pray that all the new leadership we voted in will actually make a positive difference in this city, like they promised.  We’re all sick of being lied to down here, and for the sake of everybody, we need a positive change.  Just like those 250 homeless shacked up in tents outside City Hall.

[Read "Katrina Homeless Make Tent City of Despair" on CBSNews.com]

Posted in Life, New Orleans, New Orleans Prayer Series, Politics, Prayer, Social Justice