Today’s Blog is a reprint from an article published by my old friend Lynn. It appeared Friday, Dec. 18, 2009 in the Austin American Statesman with the title “An Austin Nativity Scene turns into a different kind of shelter.”

By Lynn Goodman-Strauss

Published: 8:55 a.m. Friday, Dec. 18, 2009

Dec. 17, 1989. That date lives in my heart because the pastor and parishioners of St. George's Episcopal Church had agreed to host a live Nativity on the grounds of the little church across Interstate 35 from the Hancock Center in Austin. Dec. 17 was the starting date, and we would continue right through Christmas Eve.

Our presentation was to be a little different from the usual ones in that it would depict homeless people with nothing but their backpacks and a few blankets, quite like what we all imagined the Holy Family would be today: strangers without a place to nurture a pregnant woman, her elderly husband and their soon-to-be-born child. We advertised in the local papers, had public announcements made on radio and television and readied our bandanas and our dogs, a spare (older) baby and our raggedy clothes, to present Jesus As If He Were Born in 1989.

It never happened. At 4 p.m., the Rev. David Hoster, St. George's pastor, heard the forecast for that night and every night until Christmas: temperatures in the 20s, with sleet and snow and a wind chill factor that would bring that night's temperatures down to about 9 degrees. When he called, Hoster and I agreed that we just could not ask the good people of St. George's Church to expose themselves to the elements (as if anyone would come to see them anyway). Then we decided, if we could not ask people who live in houses to be outdoors on a horribly cold night, we could not leave our homeless brothers and sisters outside either. Hoster and I agreed that I would round up anyone I could find who was outdoors that night and bring them to the parish hall at the church.

This was difficult, however. As we later learned, anyone with any snap can find a furnace grate, or a motel room rented by friends, or even a bush to hide under by 4:30 on a winter's afternoon.

Finally I found three people who were desperate to come in from the cold. They were the first of many guests that month, and I could never have found better ones. They were a young woman about 16 years old, her 36-year-old husband and their 3-month-old daughter, refugees from the civil war in Guatemala. The husband sought asylum in the United States after Guatemalan forces imprisoned and tortured the men of their village.

As church members brought their dinners to share, their extra blankets, bedrolls and clothing for each member of the family, it became clear that the Holy Family had moved in with us at St. George's on Dec. 17, 1989. And this is where the miracle began as we undertook a series of shelters that lasted through Dec. 26.

The word got around downtown: Anyone who could not get into the Salvation Army could come to St. George's for a hot meal and a warm space on the floor. By the last night of that cold snap, 75 men had joined us nightly. Volunteers and homeless men slept on the floor side by side; families came to cook, clean, and arrange donations of food and clothing with the assistance of the men we sheltered.

On Christmas Eve, we all sang carols and ate cookies ; some of us went to the midnight Christmas service at St. George's. We read the story of the Nativity with renewed hearts and wills.

Those shelters in 1989 were the first freezing-night shelters hosted by Austin churches. Cristo Rey and San José Catholic churches soon joined St. George's folks in offering hospitality. Members of the Catholic Worker community coordinated volunteers and resources until ARCH (Austin Resource Center for the Homeless, now known as Front Steps) graciously undertook that massive project in 1997.

God had a plan that cold and inhospitable day, and it continues to unfold in the guise of hospitality and simple service to our very poor brothers and sisters.

Cristo Rey, San José and St. George's parishioners moved on to other projects, and other churches now offer shelter. Nowadays, more than half a dozen churches participate in the freezing-night shelters. A good many Christmases and Thanksgivings have been spent with our homeless friends, and the volunteers always leave saying they received infinitely more than they gave.

Front Steps always is in need of blankets, warm clothing, food, shelter locations and volunteers on the harshest winter nights. If you or your faith community wishes to share hospitality with our brothers and sisters who need shelter, please call Helen Varty, director of Front Steps, at 305-4107. Join others in the joy of the season, today and every day that strangers among us are most in need!

Lynn Goodman-Strauss lives and works at Mary House Catholic Worker, which offers free, medically supportive housing to homeless and critically or terminally ill men and women in Central Texas . She can be contacted at theegglady@sbcglobal.net.