A Busy Weekend

This weekend I had the pleasure of walking the streets for three days in a row.  It's given me another taste of what this apostolate would be like if I were able to pursue it full time.  On Saturday, Chris and I walked a a bike and pedestrian path near SE 92nd where there are lots of homeless tents.  We distributed all of our water and Gatorade within 150 yards of entering the path, and many people drank them in sixty seconds or less.  They were truly famished for drink which is typical for people on the streets.  One of the tent sites resembled a bacchanal as an attractive young woman in a tiny bikini frolicked playfully among friends who were mostly drunk or high.  I told Chris. "I'm grateful she's not my type, otherwise I'd be done for."  Later down the path was a giant mural across the back of a Boys and Girls Club.  The mural is shockingly pagan, featuring pre-Christian deities, pagan priests and the Buddha.  In some ways Chris and I felt like St. Boniface or St. Patrick, bringing Christ to the pagan tribes.  Such is Portland, Oregon.  On a happy note, we did give away more rosaries and prayer cards then we ever have before.

Jesus is Lord!  Jesus is everything.  He is the desire of the everlasting hills. By contrast, Psalm 95 tells us, "All the gods of the gentiles are demons."

On Sunday, Jeff, Chris and I did our usual walk from The Grotto along NE 82nd.  A kind woman named 'Virginia' who completed RCIA a few years ago was anxious to talk to us, and snapped the photo below in The Grotto parking lot.  She asked for our prayers to warm her son's heart, so that he might come back to her and share the joys of his tiny children. The son's name is Peter Joseph, and he prefers to focus on his work and his little family while more or less ignoring his mother.  Please pray that he re-unites with his mother, Virginia.  We then had the usual walk along 82nd, though it was 95 degrees and the street people were all hiding at Montavilla park under trees or in their sweltering tents.  Some asked where we had been, since we have been away walking other parts of the city.

Today I walked with Meagan up Burnside past the archdiocesan chancellory office.  We walked by the archdiocesan headquarters as a kind of lark since Archbishop Sample had asked why we don't walk closer to the city center.  Well, here we are, just like you asked!

I have several compelling stories to share from our time on the streets, and I hope to write about them in the coming weeks...

Yours truly, Scott Woltze, with Jeff and Chris at The Grotto