MAKING YOUR TIME AT THE SHELTER A JEWISH EXPERIENCE
Click here to return to Social Action Page
Thanks for finding this page on our website. These activities will help you enhance your service experience with your family and make it more meaningful for you.
Feeding the homeless is a mitzvah. Remember, a mitzvah is not a “good deed”, it’s an obligation, something that we are commanded to do. In this case, you are fulfilling the mitzvah of: Gimilut hesed, performing an act of loving kindness.
As you gather with your group in the kitchen, before you begin cooking, you may want to recite a bracha to remind yourself that you are fulfilling a commandment and doing something that not only “feels good” but is a Jewish commandment. You may want to recite this bracha:
Blessed are you Adonai, Ruler of the World who acts with loving kindness and creates all things.
Baruch Ata Adonai, Elohenu Melech HaOlam Gomel Chasadim Tovim V’Konay HaKol.
There are other ritual suggestions below.
As you are cooking, or when you are cleaning up, take a moment to read some of these quotes below. Print them out and take them along with you. There are suggestions for reflections on the quotes to guide your discussions.
There is also a suggestion for other things to thing about. Take a moment as a group before you walk out the door to share some reflections on your experience of the evening.
RITUAL:
Consider adding the following to your time at the shelter:
-Before you begin food preparation, say the bracha:
Blessed are you Adonai, Ruler of the World who acts with loving kindness and creates all things.
Baruch Ata Adonai, Elohenu Melech HaOlam Gomel Chasadim Tovim V’Konay HaKol.
- If this is your first time doing this mitzvah, say a Shehechiyanu:
Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the universe, who has kept us alive, and sustained us, and enabled us to reach this moment.
Baruch Atah Adonai Eloheinu Melech Ha-Olam Shehehchiyahnu vekiyamanu vehegianu lazman ha-zeh.
-Start your meal with a communal motzi, or do a motzi for the table where you are sitting. Explain that this is a Jewish way of acknowledging that God brought forth bread from the earth. Ask the men if they have a similar tradition and invite them to share their way of blessing food.
-Do the same with the Birkat HaMazon. (Google: Birkat HaMazon to download a copy) You could try singing the first paragraph for the men and saying that it is our Jewish obligation to give thanks after we have eaten. If you don’t know the Birkat, consider reading the first paragraph in translation.
Blessed is The Lord our God, Sovereign of the universe, who sustains the entire world with goodness, kindness and mercy. God gives food to all creatures, for God’s mercy is everlasting. Through God’s abundant goodness we have not lacked sustenance, and may we not lack sustenance forever, for the sake of God’s great name. God sustains all, does good to all, and provides food for all the creatures whom God has created. Blessed is The Lord our God, who provides food for all.
JEWISH TEXTS:
1. When you are asked in the world to come, "What was your work?" and you answer, "I fed the hungry," you will be told, "This is the gate of the Lord, enter into it, you who have fed the hungry." (Midrash Psalms 118:17)
REFLECTION: Entering the “gate of the Lord” may or may not have been your motivation for participating this evening. Why did you choose to be here?
2. A group of people was traveling in a boat. One of them took a drill and began to drill a hole beneath his seat. His companions said to him, “Why are you doing this?” The man replied, “What concern is it of yours? Am I not drilling under my own place?” They replied to him, “But if you continue, you will flood the boat for us all!” Midrash Leviticus Rabbah (4:6)
REFLECTION: How do the boat, the water and the hole relate to your experience this evening?
3. Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “I would like to go to the fields and glean among the ears of grain, behind someone who may show me kindness.”{ Ruth 2:2}
REFLECTION: How is gleaning in the fields like living in a homeless shelter?
THINGS TO DISCUSS WITH YOUR COOKING GROUP:
What were your expectations of the evening before you got here? After eating with the men this evening, in what ways were your stereotypes or assumptions challenged?
Most people participate in cooking for the shelter because they feel it is the “right” thing to do. After participating and after reading some of the quotes on this site, how was what you did this evening become a “Jewish” thing to do? Did any of the quotes on the site speak to this for you?
Do you recall a specific occurrence that involved some degree of conflict/difficulty? How did you deal with that?
FACTS:
Who is Homeless in Alameda County?
Alameda Countywide Shelter and Services Survey, May 2004 Report
-
As many as 16,000 people experience homelessness during the course of a year.
-
6,215 people are homeless on any given night.
-
Children comprise 28% of the county’s homeless population (1,755).
-
Families comprise 43% of the county’s homeless population (2,691).
-
More urbanized areas of Oakland and Berkeley have higher percentages of adults unaccompanied by children.
-
More suburban areas of Mid, South and East County have higher percentages of families with children (including single parent families).
Lack of Affordable Housing
Out of Reach 2006, National Low Income Housing Coalition and Housing California
-
Alameda County is one of the top 10 least affordable housing markets in the U.S.
-
A family earning minimum wage needs to work over 142 hours a week, 52 weeks a year to afford a modest two-bedroom apartment.
-
A disabled individual earns less per month from SSI ($812) than the fair market value of a studio apartment ($900).
-
Approximately 34,000 (6%) of Alameda County’s 523,000 households are at severe risk of homelessness because they are extremely low-income renters paying more than 50% of their income on housing.
