how could i not post about this?

so, today i had a meeting with mayor c. ray nagin of new orleans. well actually, it wasnt just a one-on-one meeting between little emily and big ray. it was a meeting organized by ACT (All Congregations Together) which is a PICO-modelled group (much like OCO in Oakland). this is a collaboration of faith leaders from throughout the city who have been working together for years and years to bring attention to various issues in the community. i was at the meeting because i and my co-worker emily ling were representing Desire Street/CURE and Carver Desire Baptist Church (the church that Pastor Willis, executive director of CURE, leads). so again, as emily said afterwards, i found myself in a position wondering how in the world did i get here?? we watched the devastation of the storm, the levee breaches, the flood with the rest of the world and stayed glued to the tv over a year ago. and now, here we are, in the mayor's office, pressing him on the issues of housing, health care, crime, education. craziness. God uses the weak to confound the strong, huh?

the work we are trying to undertake is gentrification with justice. because, you see, this city is like a developer's dream right now. all this land, barely any homeowners in sight, and so much that needs to be demolished and rebuilt. so in the land of capitalism and the free market, why not make a profit off of it? well, i'll tell you why not. because there were people who've lived here for generations and they will be shut out of the only homes they know. because profit is not more important than people. because housing with justice will create a better community than the highest-end lifestyle around every corner. i could go on.... so many of the faith communities here are trying to pursue this and it's a tough road to go down, especially since so few have had previous experience. but there are others around the country who have done this stuff and we're just trying to learn from them. each day, as we do seemingly small administrative tasks, i can catch glimpses of the bigger picture.....that afternoon 7 months from now when we're standing behind a ribbon with unrealistically large scissors, opening the door for the first family to move back in to their new home. almost gives me goosebumps. so we keep moving along...determined to not lose hope.

if you want to partner in this work of gentrification with justice and don't know how best to use your talents, please consider donating to my support fund. the money enables me to be here and contribute to the rebuilding of the beautiful Crescent City. click the link on the left that says "donate..." thanks for your prayers and encouragement!!

straight from my journal to your eyes...

so i'm trying to explore prayer in hopes of pursuing a deeper connection with God. you know, i go through ups and downs of the "feeling" of connectedness to God through prayer and i really like the ups. so i'm trying to get back there. living a year like this affords me the opportunity and encouragement to pursue disciplines in a way i may not have taken the effort otherwise.

i'm reading through a book called "50 ways to pray" and one of the exercises i recently went through focused on Mark 10.35-40…

Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to him. "Teacher," they said, "we want you to do for us whatever we ask." "What do you want me to do for you?" Jesus asked. They replied, "Let one of us sit at your right and the other at your left in your glory." "You don't know what you are asking," Jesus said. "Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?" "We can," they answered. Jesus said to them, "You will drink the cup I drink and be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with, but to sit at my right or left is not for me to grant. These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared."

in this passage, James and John come up to tell Jesus "We want you to do for us whatever we ask of you." now i would respond to them like--who do you think you are, demanding that God do you a favor? and Jesus could say to them--don't you know who I am, and you're asking Me to fulfill your every wish? they have seen his miracles, heard his parables, even seen him calm a storm with a word. indeed, they must believe he is who he says he is, complete with the power he has shown that he has, otherwise they probably wouldn't have come to him with this statement.

and yet, i do the same thing as them: "Jesus, I want you to do for me whatever I ask you to do. Jesus, do this for me. Jesus, do that.” yet how often do i reflect the reality that he doesn’t owe us anything, any favors. he doesn’t have to do anything for us. how often are my requests drenched in the thankfulness that is due Him? the thankfulness that we even have the chance to come and ask? the thankfulness that he might consider us to be a part of His story on earth, in people’s lives.

and apart from how i think i would have reacted to james and john, what does Jesus actually say? "what do you want me to do for you?" ah yes, He doesn’t have the same selfish, self-righteous, be-served attitude that i so often carry. He is the great server, whose ultimate service has set us free. nothing in Him expresses frustration with our questions--ugh, what do you want now? you just asked me for enough yesterday! i don’t have the patience for that, but God does. he welcomes our questions and requests. he doesn't scoff at the desires of our hearts. he seeks our heart, ambitions, motives in handling our requests. he has guaranteed us a response. he has even promised that anything we ask for in his spirit will come to pass (John 15.7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you.) amazing!!

the prayer exercise goes on to place the reader in the setting of the story and into the position of answering to Jesus what she wants him to do for her. incredible. with the attitude of a servant, Jesus longs to hear our heart's requests. he knows our need and wants to be close enough to us that we trust Him to meet them. he is not too bothered or self-consumed (like me) to tend to us. in fact, that’s' his greatest joy: tending to His people in mercy and grace to ensure their good and His glory.

He's not like us, but calls us to be like Him.

and another reminder from the prayer book...this one focused on deuteronomy 1.6-8

Back at Horeb, God, our God, spoke to us: "You've stayed long enough at this mountain. On your way now. Get moving. Head for the Amorite hills, wherever people are living in the Arabah, the mountains, the foothills, the Negev, the seashore—the Canaanite country and the Lebanon all the way to the big river, the Euphrates. Look, I've given you this land. Now go in and take it. It's the land God promised to give your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and their children after them."

the thing that stuck with me from this was how the people were on Mt. Sinai and God had to tell them it was time to come down from the mountain. they needed to come down to continue the journey to the promised land. i am so stubborn and i want to cling to the mountain tops. i think in those moments, while in the valleys of life or trudging along the bumpy path, we long to be on the peak, even longing to be back on top of the previous mountain. but truly, coming down from the mountain is the only way forward. do we really expect to leap from peak to peak in our journey of knowing God? i forget that it is a forward trek and not intended to end on each mountain top. thus, coming down is required to move forward.

A week in the life

Life here is now measured in pre-Katrina and post-Katrina terms so I thought you might like to catch a glimpse of my post-Katrina life down here in New Orleans. Here is a rough sketch of what this past week was like for me.

I get to work around 8:30ish am with Emily, one of my teammates and we have a brief check-in time with our supervisors, Ben and Pastor Willis. We're reading through Bob Lupton's book "And You Call Yourself a Christian" together and talking about what it really means and looks like to love our neighbors. It's not as easy as it might seem, especially in the complexities of today's urban communities. I really appreciate this opportunity to spend non-logistical/administrative/"work" time with Ben and Pastor Willis since they have different perspectives from which I can learn a lot. Plus, it shows that they are really committed to helping us grow into our work here, instead of it just being a long list of things-to-do. As for what we else we do during the work day: meetings, making contact with groups who want to volunteer, helping Ben and Pastor Willis stay organized, and furthering the vision of helping to make the Upper Ninth Ward a desirable place to live.

On Monday and Tuesday afternoon, we went with Ben up to Baton Rouge to visit Desire Street Academy in its new home. The school was started in 2002 by Desire Street Ministries after the staff realized that after-school tutoring within the current public school system would still leave the students lacking in necessary skills and education to succeed beyond high school. So this school was formed. It had been housed in a large multi-purpose ministry building right in the neighborhood, but the storm changed all that. Last year the school held classes and boarded students at a camp in Florida. This year, it has more permanently relocated to Baton Rouge. It will probably stay here for a while, though there are hopes to bring it back to New Orleans eventually. Since the DSA sports teams are still technically part of the New Orleans sports league, all the home games must be played in New Orleans. So we get to watch the high school basketball games this winter!

On Wednesday night, we were invited to a bar-be-que with a year-long relief team from Campus Crusade for Christ. I have been surprised to meet so many other young people who have committed a year to helping New Orleans rebuild. It is so encouraging to us to see how the efforts to rebuild this city have really been driven by volunteers. And, it’s encouraging to know we'll have another group of young people we could hang out with this year who might be able to understand some of the struggles and frustrations we will face. We hope to spend more time with these friends throughout the year.

Thursday night we got a real sampling of New Orleans cuisine. Leroy Barber, president of Mission Year, was in town for some meetings and wanted to hang out with my team. We found a great restaurant/grocery that served authentic Creole cuisine. On the table for dinner were po-boy sandwiches, etouffe, red beans and rice, and of course jambalaya. (Every time I say that word it still reminds me of George on Seinfeld when he wants his "jam-ba-layyaaaa") That was deeeelicious. Then, to top it off, we had dessert at Creole Creamery. They have some crazy ice cream flavors like sassafras-chicory, lavender-honey, cucumber-dill, Creole-cream cheese. They also have some more normal flavors and I presume this will be a spot that is frequented by my team this year.

We knew we would be hosting our first volunteer team this coming Monday, so on Friday we checked out a house that still needed to be gutted. This house belonged to a family in the Desire Area that had just moved back into the city from Houston the previous week. We ran into them when we were driving around, mapping out the status of the neighborhood. Being in their house was CRAZY! They had just gotten their FEMA trailer (over a year since the storm) and nothing has been done in the house. As we walked in, stepping over carpet and mattresses and TVs still caked in a thin layer of dry mud, I wondered about this family. I wondered about the people who lived here, who called this place home. The woman we met that day driving through the neighborhood, she owns this place. I wondered what those moments during the storm were like for them. I wondered if they had scrambled up to the attic when the water began to flow into their street, their block, their house. The freezer and fridge still sit in the living room where they had undoubtedly floated. I saw a kid’s bike covered in mud and dirt in a back room and wondered about the little person who used to ride it. The water line was still visible on the wall, I even wiped a little of the dirt off the wall with my finger. And now, everything needs to go. The walls, the carpet, the furniture, the TVs, the computer, the fridge. Everything. This house, that used to be a symbol of rest and place to come back to—going to be wiped out down to the framing. It just made me wonder about the memories and moments and lives those walls had seen.

Saturday was the District 7 planning meeting, hosted by ACORN. (Now just for some background about the planning process in New Orleans…Over 80% of the city was flooded during the storm. That's a lot, but it's not every neighborhood. Initially, individual neighborhoods were making recovery and rebuilding plans, hoping to make their section of the city better than before the storm. Then the city decided that instead of just updating the neighborhoods that had been flooded, they wanted a plan for the entire city. Hence, the Unified New Orleans Plan (www.unifiedneworleansplan.org) In the Unified plan, each neighborhood is represented by some planning group. District 7, which includes the upper ninth ward, is being represented by ACORN (www.acorn.org)) So, this was actually the FIRST District 7 UNOP meeting. Yes, that's right, over a year post-Katrina and they're having the first meeting. As I sat in the back of the meeting, I thought about what I had written previously about the spirit of the people in New Orleans. Yes there’s a spirit of wanting to rebuild but its stemming from a frustration and exhaustion from having no answers, getting the run-around, still not having their houses fixed—no place to sleep! People are sick and tired of not being given answers, not given help, not given hope. This is a planning meeting (which is far from the implementation phase), and they were showing boards and notes from all sort of community planning that had been done pre-Katrina. And we’re trying to do all this with neighborhoods that maybe didn’t even talk to each other before the storm. Now they’re supposed to suddenly be united? People want their liiiiiives back. we’re at this planning “vision” meeting and the facilitator is asking them to imagine what they could have in their community by 2010—2010?!?! Some of the people here don’t know where they’ll be sleeping TONIGHT! And years and years and years of crooked New Orleans politics have taught residents not to trust anything that comes from the government. So there’s so many complex layers upon layers. And to be honest, the work that’s been done for the most part is because these people were fed up of waiting for someone ELSE to help them and they just decided to help themselves. They found someone to gut their houses, they harassed the energy company, they stayed all day, everyday on the phone with FEMA. They’re tired of waiting.

But my new friend Paulette reminded me, as we sat in the back listening to the meeting, "I know where my help comes from." Our hope and our help will ultimately not come from the government or politicians. There is a limited amount of resources and the interests of running a city are unfortunately not always dictated by the interests of its most vulnerable citizens. I have been encouraged to remember that God stands by with a heart that breaks for the oppressed and mistreated. God provides a hope that doesn't promise immediate results, but does promise a sovereign force in control. When we have no one else to look to for help, we can still go to the One who has created us all and holds us in the palm of His hands.

After the meeting, we drove around the neighborhood to continue in our mapping efforts and someone stopped us. We were driving slowly and taking notes, really not making any attempts to blend in. The man came over to see what we were doing and when we explained that we were with Desire Street and Pastor Willis, he immediately gave us the scoop on the neighborhood. I realized this was the husband of a woman in the meeting who had shared her own story of trying to get back to the neighborhood. The energy company refused to turn on her power since there were no other customers. But she kept bothering them to turn it on and finally they did. And then, the neighbors returned. This man pointed out to us each of the houses and the status of the residents. This was a real true community before the storm, and it is making steps towards regaining that form. He invited us into their home and showed off the handiwork of a house completely remodeled. It was remodeled by necessity and he had done such a nice job with it. The visit with this man was a taste of that light and hope amidst so much frustration and despair.

There is so much yet to do and I am excited to see how the upcoming weeks and months pan out. Desire Street and CURE are taking on some big projects to fulfill a vision for the neighborhood that had been home to so many. I am reminded of a visit to San Francisco earlier this year, around the time of the 100 year anniversary of the great San Francisco earthquake. The image that came to mind was a phoenix, rising from the ash. And I hope and I pray that that will be said of New Orleans in the months and years to come.

One Month Down in the Big Easy

Periodical update #1

Before I came here, the buzzword for preparation was FLEXIBILITY. We heard it in june when we came down for a round of interviews in Mississippi and we heard it many times between then and the beginning of September, when we arrived for training. And I have found that FLEXIBILITY really is critical to maintaining balance and sanity down in the gulf coast these days. It manifests itself in a variety of ways and the effects of the storm show up differently each day. We see it when we drive down the major road near our house and see what used to be a taco bell now turned into a new Orleans seafood fast-food restaurant. We pass by many other fast-food places whose signs either seem trapped in time because of no change since the storm or advertise wages over $10/hour just to attract enough employees to serve customers again. We see progress in construction, or deconstruction in some cases, every day. We drove up to our house last night, coming back from a 5-day training in new mexico and we noticed a new portable storage unit in front of one of our neighbor’s homes.
Life here also looks like long lines at a restaurant and at the bank because, as the hostess at Olive Garden told us, open tables don’t mean available staff. There are staffing shortages everywhere, even while the businesses have to re-open to stay afloat. The 24-hour sign on the Walgreens across the street is not lit up, and the store is only open now from 7am to 9pm. The spray painted symbols which remain on nearly on every house, from when the search teams went through to identify potential hazards or dead bodies. You can hear it in the stories…oh the stories that everyone wants to tell! Flexibility also means that wherever you’re trying to go will probably lack street signs along the way. Having a map doesn’t really help if you don’t know the name of the street you just passed.
Flexibility also shows up when I realize how our jobs will be effected. desire street ministries has been split up between three cities—the school is in baton rouge, the main administrative offices are in destin, florida, and the office where I’m working is located in what used to be a pediatric medical clinic leased by the ministry. The multi-purpose ministry building is up and running, but only the part with the basketball court and not the section with office space. Thus, the renovations of the office that I will share with my teammate Emily are just being finished…over a year since the storm. When I start to get frustrated that the documents I’m trying to fax through just wont seem to connect, a small voice reminds me to be flexible. The fax machine is on a table in a back room, and just a few days ago it was buried under a pile of ladders, tile, light bulbs and other construction materials du jour. Is it hooked up to the phone line? Is the phone line working? Do other people know the fax line number of the new office? We are in the midst of creating the illusion of a fully functioning office, but there are kinks in nearly everything we try to do. My response could be frustration but a small voice reminds me to be flexible. The storm that has thrown a wrench in all our smooth operations is the reason I am here. So I take a deep breath and commit to trying the fax machine again tomorrow.
The recent Saints football game a few Mondays ago nearly brought the city to a standstill—it was like a holiday! It represented so much for the city. It brought so much hope for the city to be revived. It was a transformation of the superdome, which had become a representation of all that was horribly wrong about the aftermath of the storm. It meant national attention for people to see how much has been done, and the fact that we still need more help! It showed that people were willing to invest in this place once again, something that is so needed for the city to become even better than it once was. The spirit of the people here is committed to rebuilding and renewing this beloved city.
My teammate Emily and I are working in the upper ninth ward, a community that used to have about 5,000 residents. Now there are probably only about 50 people living there. The neighborhood is pretty unlivable though. For the most part, it looks like the storm hit last week. There are some trailers scattered here and there, but other than that there are few signs of life. There is at least one house with the outside wall gone where you can see a couch still precariously balanced on the second floor. Many of these houses have not yet been gutted and probably will not be before the city decides to tear them down. There is a bright side in all this, though. For a community that may not have been a healthy and desirable place to live previously, this is a great opportunity. This is a fresh start to redevelop the neighborhood in a way that makes a good place to live again. The city needs its residents to come back, but in neighborhoods like this, there is not much currently to come back to. When I lived in Oakland, there were so many things that my teammates and I observed and lived through that we wished we could change. There was so much of the culture that was ingrained in the rhythm of the place. Even if we made changes in the life of an individual, which I am not discounting, there were so many structural injustices and hindrances that had, over time, developed an iron-grip on the community. But here, all that was wiped away with the storm. It is exciting to think about the changes that can be made in the structure of the community, and in the lives of its residents who will hopefully come back when they see these positive changes beginning. For now, we are still in the planning stages.
As for the house and community where I am living, things look a little different than the upper ninth ward. Broadmoor, my neighborhood, is a part of Uptown, an area just west of the Garden District and French Quarter. Desire Street Ministries is about 5 miles to the east of us, but many things make it feel much farther away. Across the street from our house, there is a FEMA trailer in a yard, though we have never seen anyone go in or out of this property. There is not much other activity on our immediate block and I’m pretty sure that the houses behind and next to us have not yet been gutted. Standing on our back porch, we can still see a pile of clothes and washing machine strewn out the back door. There is a house located kiddie-corner from us where 4 middle-aged guys are living. They are from Kentucky and they came down here earlier this year to take advantage of the construction opportunities.
The Broadmoor neighborhood association is one of the oldest in the country, as opposed to the upper ninth ward community association which CURE and Desire Street had a role in forming recently. Residents of Broadmoor mobilized very soon after the storm, especially since the city initially planned to turn the neighborhood into a giant green space. This area is one that has one of the worst flooding histories in the city, but a drainage plan that has been in effect since the 1990s has proven very effective. Except, of course, when your storm defense systems collapse and are overtopped and your whole city becomes a fishbowl. My teammates and I attended a meeting of the neighborhood association and it was highly organized and well-attended. They announced that night that an initiative to generate private funding for the rebuilding efforts would be announced the following week at the Clinton Global Initiative summit in New York City. No word yet on the pledges that were garnered. It’s exciting to be a part of such an active neighborhood, one that is mixed in nearly every way. I’m excited too to get to know more of the neighbors who are back here, trying to rebuild. As for our house, if you know anything about Mission Year, you would think this place was a palace. Now, if you have “normal” standards, then the place we’re in is just fine. But for me, I couldn’t believe it when I saw it. It’s a shotgun house so it’s long with the rooms connected to each other, and no substantial hall way. There are hardwood floors, ceiling fans, and even a DISHWASHER!! We have air conditioning and new furniture and plentiful cabinet space. It’s great.
My teammates and I are getting along well also. I’ve actually been surprised at how quickly the differences between having 4 roommates and 2 have become apparent. We’re still figuring out each others’ habits and quirks and getting into the process of digging out the deeper stuff.

I plan to be posting updates periodically, perhaps, when I am feeling extra ambitious, more often than once a month. Thank you all for your prayers and support and birthday phone calls from afar!! If you would still like to contribute financially, you can send a check to Mission Year, 2520 S. Western Avenue, #304, Chicago IL 60608 (indicate Emily Rhodes--Gulf Coast) or donate online through www.missionyear.org/donate. I love you all and look forward to sharing the ups and downs of this year with you. Please do not hesitate to post your comments or questions, or even contact me directly by email (Emily.rhodes@alumni.tufts.edu) to talk more about your life or mine!