Episcopal Peace Fellowship young adults take gospel to Austin’s streets

Posted Mar 22, 2013
Lynn Goodman-Strauss, director of Mary House Catholic Worker (left), with Austin pilgrims to her left (bottom row) Telesa Bennett Pasquale, Rachel Snyder, Sarah Watkins (seated), (top row) Heather Strickland, Kayleigh Chapman and Lia Closel. Photo: EPF

Lynn Goodman-Strauss, director of Mary House Catholic Worker (left), with Austin pilgrims to her left (bottom row) Telesa Bennett Pasquale, Rachel Snyder, Sarah Watkins (seated), (top row) Heather Strickland, Kayleigh Chapman and Lia Closel. Photo: EPF

[Episcopal Peace Fellowship — Press Release] An active group of six young women explored issues of homelessness and immigration during their Urban Pilgrimage of five days in mid-March here. Two other Episcopal Peace Fellowship Urban pilgrimages took place in New York City and Santa Paula, Calif.

The Austin group spent significant time at the Mary House Catholic Worker – the only non-profit in Central Texas where indigent people with serious medical problems can stay without charge until they die in hospice care or become well enough to leave.

The Austin pilgrims then went to Flo’s Place – a community center for impoverished neighborhood children – where they joined several youth groups from Austin churches in cleaning the grounds and fixing what was broken. Flo, who has run the center with donations for several years, tells the story about once receiving several new sneakers and giving them to the children. Sadly, some of the parents sold them for drug money.

The next day’s visit was to Casa Marianella – a three-plus-decades-old immigration center for folks from Mexico and Central America whose status is both legal and not. Casa has six houses close to each other in East Austin where guests receive food, lodging and, if needed, legal guidance to become citizens.

The pilgrims also explored the Mobile Loaves and Fishes food ministry that feeds Austin’s neediest where they are gathered rather than making them come to a center.

“Now in its sixth year, our Spring Pilgrimages give college students and other young adults the opportunity to learn from both the persons who live on the edges of our society, as well as those who daily help them,” said the Rev. Allison Liles, EPF interim director. “It is a meaningful alternative to the Spring Break experience and energizes the pilgrims to return to their home towns to do the same,” she said.

“Each year I learn something new,” said Heather Strickland, who directed Urban Pilgrimage Austin this March – her third trip to Austin from Ludlow, Mass. “Hospitals increasingly tend to dismiss homeless patients earlier than they should because these folks have no insurance,” said Strickland who works as a rape crisis center counselor.

Half of the Austin pilgrims – Lia Closel, Rachel Snyder and Kayleigh Chapman – were sponsored by St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Arlington, Texas. Snyder and Chapman took part in last year’s Austin pilgrimage. Sarah Watkins from St. James’ Episcopal Church in Austin and Teresa Bennett Pasquale of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Delray Beach, Fla. rounded out the group.

The New York City pilgrimage explored the lingering effects of Mega-storm Sandy on its still battered residents.

The group walked through a devastated neighborhood where residents came out of their damaged homes “to wave and encourage us. The image that lingers in my mind is of a woman silently sobbing behind her storm door as we passed – covering her face with her hands,” one pilgrim wrote.  Another post noted that many of the folks involved in post-Sandy relief are also Occupy Wall Street veterans – “It has been really awesome to see people look out for and take care of one another,” another pilgrim wrote.

Food, Faith & Farming – the third EPF Urban pilgrimage – will explore issues of immigration, food sustainability and eco-justice at the Abundant Farms in Santa Paula, Calif., in late March.

The Episcopal Peace Fellowship has championed peace, nonviolence and social justice issues since its founding on Armistice Day 1939. Read more about EPF – http://epfnational.org


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