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"I know someone with nowhere to stay..."

"Have you found a place yet? I know someone with nowhere to stay.”  “I wish the Catholic Worker in St. Louis was up and running, I’m aware of a mother and daughter in need of housing for a few nights.” Ever since we announced our plans to open a new Catholic Worker house in the St. Louis area we’ve received inquiries like these.   We live in a world where a handful of billionaires control as much wealth as 4 billion people and so people go without housing, without food and water, without healthcare. People die. In our own city those without housing have slept on the very doorstep of city hall, until they were unceremoniously evicted. Our city government mirrors that of our state and federal counterparts, they do not want to be confronted with these problems, they do not want to see the sufferers of an uncaring and inhuman system, but they are unable if not unwilling to offer any real and humane solutions. We at the budding St. Louis Catholic Worker know we cannot help everyone...
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Bulldozers & F35s - The Tools of Capital

They said to be there at 6am. The cops were going to be there at the brink of dawn to remove people from their home and community. I was on donut and snack duty to ensure that people had something comforting to ease the trauma of another spring, another displacement. We rose early to hand out snacks and basic needs. We were there to stop state repression and its tools: dump trucks, patrol cars, bulldozers, and government officials who pretend to house humans displaced by the violence of eviction. Saint Louis city tries to evict the Riverfront Community every spring. When it was zero degrees this Christmas, the city left the camp alone. Mutual aid workers brought propane and warm layers around the clock. Yet, it never fails that when the leaves bud and the sun returns, so do camp evictions and the closure of shelters. This year when April arrived, three city funded shelters closed (Hope House, St. James, and Asbury). Because homelessness is only a winter problem. But homelessness wasn’t...
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Becoming Irresistible

 “We convert, if we do at all, by being something irresistible, not by demanding the impossible.”  Those words by May Sarton were posted in a Catholic Worker farm’s office. The sign originated at the homestead of Wally and Quanita Nelson who were early pioneers of the modern war tax resistance movement.  After the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagaski, people including Ammon Hennacy, an early member of the Catholic Worker, organized actions around tax day in 1946 with their refusal to pay for war and to raise awareness of the enormous amounts of taxpayer money going to war annually.    What drew me into the Catholic Worker and war tax resistance was the irrepressible joy of the people in these movements. They were able to look at the heaviness of militarism while also addressing the needs within their communities. My introduction to the Catholic Worker coincided with becoming a war tax resister. I was blessed by a community of support who instructed me ...
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