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environment. It happens over checkers and
spilled Kool-Aid. It happens when a former
foster kids holds in her hands in the first honest-to-God paycheck from a job that, despite
the hassle of the bus schedule, she loves.
It happens when a kid allows himself to
grieve in the arms of a mentor who doesn’t
try to fix the pain, but grieves that pain as if
it were his own. It happens when despite all
the bullshit that we’re fed about ‘troubled
kids,’ a social worker looks across the table
in her office and practices radical empathy,
letting the youth know that they are heard
and that they belong.
For 7 years, my friends and I have been
dreaming of a place where homeless youth
can experience the sense of belonging that
leads to true healing – We wanted to open
a drop-in center. A place that is a front door
to healthy relationships, and a self-directed
future. A place where an entire community
of people, from liquor store clerks to the
police chief, knows that if these kids are nobody’s kids, then they are our kids.
In a Kafka-esque turn of events, last
year I moved from being a social worker to
a pastor … a move that even my Grandma
found comical. I had no intention of ever
working for a church, but when I told Mars
Hill Bible Church that I wanted to open
a Runaway and Homeless Youth Drop-In
Center in partnership with a local organization called Arbor Circle -- and they doubled
down -- I was in. So, after years talking with
colleagues, researching methodology, and
watching kids slip through the cracks of the
community and the systems that exist to
serve them, we are two months away from
opening HQ, the first Drop-In Center for Runaway and Homeless Youth in Grand Rapids.
I believe HQ is the place for those of us
whose limp is less noticeable to slow our
pace to be good company for those whose
wound is fresh. So while I may be coming
off as the guy that just wants to ‘Buy the
World a Coke’, I am aware of one simple fact:
it is hard to grow when all you can do is survive. Trauma can make dreams anemic and
dispensable.
But to belong. To be safe. To be missed
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when you’re gone. To find out that you are
good at Algebra. To learn that your abilities
are not only valuable, but vital to the success of the kid sitting next to you. To be a
creative agent, not just an object. This is
what HQ exists to do for homeless youth.
While HQ honors the challenges homeless youth face because of the way they
have developed, we know they face innumerably more socially.
• 75% of RHY will drop out of school
• 40% of RHY are LGBTQ
• 20% of RHY are pregnant or parenting.
• 25% of former foster children will become homeless within 4 years of aging
out of the system.
• 28% of RHY report having engaged in
survival sex to obtain food, housing, or
other basic needs.
These challenges are not overcome
by them ‘getting themselves together’ or
‘making better choices’ (and despite our
culture admonishing that these kids need
to be ‘pulling themselves up by their boot
straps’, please know that the brain has neurons, lobes, and other structures, but no
boot straps). Challenges faced by homeless
youth need to be understood as challenges
that we all carry. No program can solve the
problem, but relationships can.
Tonight, like most nights in Grand Rapids, there are 200 kids without a stable
place to sleep (2000 in any given year). The
hope of HQ – the hope we invite you into –
isn’t just about a bed to sleep in. It is about
belonging. It is about kinship. It is about allowing a brain that can’t rest to finally sleep
easy…where it can dream.
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