Courtney Hong
Living Assistant
Rare is the college student (or anyone, for that matter) who doesn’t just walk by but instinctively looks at a homeless person as a human being and says, “You have a destiny, a plan, a purpose. The power is in you to leave this situation.”
This is what Mario Woodruff, 23, needed someone to say to him when he was homeless and impoverished for three years in Colorado shortly after graduating from high school. This is what Woodruff shared with those who attended Chapel on Sunday night. His message is the theme of National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week, sponsored by the Pepperdine Volunteer Center and funded by the Lilly Endowment Grant.
Calling his time spent homeless “an honor” because it has enabled him to reach out to others, Woodruff, who currently serves at the Dream Center in Los Angeles, is one of many voices crying out to the Pepperdine community, and more than 600 colleges across the nation, to make it a lifelong priority to care for the poor.
“The love in your heart is not just reserved for those you see every day,” Woodruff said. “There are enough of us to reach out to every single one of our brothers and sisters out there. You could be some of the most courageous missionaries, right in your own backyard.”
Grant Matsushita, who graduated in May, also spoke during Chapel about knowing God’s love, particularly during his time at Pepperdine, and transferring that love to those who are “hungry, homeless, and poor.”
“We need to meet and receive God in new ways and minister outside of our comfort zones,” Matsushita said, who is participating in a year-long discipleship program at the Dream Center to prepare for full-time missionary work overseas. “We need to see God in the homeless. I met God through Mario.”
Events throughout this week foster the worldview of the homeless and the poor being “no longer numbers,” said junior Seth Allingham, PVC intern.
“They have needs just like we do,” Allingham said. “We really want to begin to connect our students and engage them on a personal level, where it becomes less about knowledge and more about taking responsibility for something that affects all of us, especially as Christians.”
The highlight of the week is the Shanty Town Project, from Wednesday to Thursday which allows members of different student organizations to build shelters in Joslyn Plaza using materials the PVC provided and occupy them for two days and one night.
“Students will get a sense of what it’s like to live in those kinds of conditions,” Allingham said. Throughout the week, each participant organization competes to earn points for member attendance at events, fund raising, as well as creative advertising.
On Saturday, Urban Plunge, sponsored by Campus Ministry, was the first of the week’s events, allowing participants to serve at the Dream Center and on Skid Row, which is located only a few blocks away from a much wealthier area.
Joel Roberts, CEO of People Assisting the Homeless (PATH), an organization that has helped thousands to secure jobs, finances and housing, spoke Monday about facing the homeless in Los Angeles as a community of fellow human beings and Christians.
Tuesday, Vernard Hopkins, vocational transitional coordinator and co-president of the Alumni Association for Skid Row’s Union Rescue Mission, shared a firsthand account of his former life of homelessness, focusing on how to identify with and to overcome stereotypes of the homeless.
During Convocation on Wednesday morning, Ron Sider, author of “Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger,” related his Christian faith to current social injustices.
A panel of experts in Elkins Auditorium tonight at 7 p.m. will present hunger and homelessness from policy, economic, social, organizational and other aspects. There will be a Question and Answer time during this Convocation event.
Jeremiah Johnson will speak during Celebration Chapel at 10 a.m. Friday about his former life on the streets and how it has shaped his faith.
Saturday, students can help build a house for a low-income family through Habitat for Humanity as part of an international effort to make affordable housing available. That same day, thousands of citizens will join PATH, celebrities and politicians to clean up downtown Los Angeles.
For more information please contact the Pepperdine Volunteer Center at ext. 4143.
11-18-04
