| D.C. doctor discusses work with poor
By Noah Kruis
Staff Writer
“Why work with the poor?” was the question posed by Dr. David Hilfiker at his lecture on Monday. The large lecture hall in the basement of the Science Building filled with students, faculty and even local news media who were interested in his response. Hilfiker is a former medical doctor who now works as a writer and lecturer. His latest book is titled “Urban Injustice: Why Ghettoes Happen.”
His career began with seven years of service as a family practitioner in rural Minnesota. After relocating to Washington, D.C., he founded and served as the medical director at Christ’s House, a medical recovery center for homeless men. After five years there, he and his family moved into Joseph’s House. This program provided an intentional community environment and hospice care for formerly homeless men struggling with AIDS.
Hilfiker listed four major reasons why we should work with the poor: a demand for social justice, the richness of living in community with the poor, building the reign of God and the opportunity to accept ourselves in our woundedness.
In reference to the first reason, Hilfiker quoted Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., saying “None of us is well until all of us are well.” He then went on to discuss the issues of social justice in America today. This was prefaced with a disclaimer that most of his work had been with African-Americans in the Washington, D.C. area, when statistically most of those people living below the poverty level in the United States are white.
Hilfiker proceeded with a seven-minute listing of various statistics, with the caveat that “statistics can be quite misleading.” He noted that while welfare has gone down, those people who are no longer supported by it don’t have jobs that pay a living wage. The actual percentage of Americans in poverty has gone down in recent years, but those who were poor, simply got poorer. The average unemployment rate is now six percent, which is up from four percent in 2000, but again the average is misleading. When looking only at African-American males without a high school diploma, the rate is 19 percent. Hilfiker also noted that the average only includes those who are actively seeking jobs.
One of his main concerns was with childhood poverty. “For the richest country the world has ever seen, treating 20 percent of children the way we do is a grave sin, one that will haunt us for years to come,” Hilfiker said.
Hilfiker then challenged his audience by saying that, “Almost all of us in this room are benefiting.” He pierced the somber silence that followed with, “Trust me.” He pointed out that those in the room were, for the most part, benefiting from the market economy and higher education. The same things that benefit us cause the poor to suffer.
He acknowledged that this has been a hard reality to accept, especially when working with those who are suffering. He proposed that healing ourselves can come from solidarity with the poor, who seem to be excluded by those benefits. Hilfiker continued with his next reason, the richness of living in community with the poor.
Hilfiker shared the story of Howard Janifer, one of the men who joined the community at Joseph’s house. Howard had kept up his habits of drug addictions while living on the streets by “working” as a cat burglar for seventeen years. When he found out that he had contracted AIDS he showed up at the house. He wasn’t expected to live more than a year. Most of the men who came were far enough advanced in their illness that they died within several months. Somehow, Howard remained a member of the community for six and a half years.
His first reaction to the house was that “Anyone could break in…and that’s a professional opinion.” As he continued to live in the house, he “discovered a special gift in helping the men die.” When one of his housemates was nearing the end, Howard would comfort him by singing to him, holding him, feeding him, and cleaning him. His explanation for this radical change was that he had destroyed his own life with drugs and alcohol, but God had given him a new one that he would use for God.
The third reason for working with the poor was that it was building the reign of God. This was seen on a personal level through Howard’s story as well as other touching memories from the clients of Joseph’s House.
Hilfiker wanted to also call attention to the reign of God on a larger scale. Historically, “the poor are the latest in a long line of scapegoats.” Throughout history there has always been an out group on which those in power have projected their inner violence to the point of exclusion. The poor have not only been blamed for their own poverty, but blamed for other social problems as well. The first task for the Christian though, Hilfiker claims, is inclusion—loving your neighbor as yourself.
By taking people in who had been rejected by society and by family and living with them in community, those who lived in Joseph’s House showed Christian hospitality and inclusion to those who had been outcast.
The final reason posited by Hilfiker is the opportunity to accept ourselves in our woundedness. “Hope,” he said, “is independent of our capability for success.” This reality was made clear to him as he came to grips with his own chronic depression. He shared that at one point he had come to a point where the depression incapacitated him. He was unable to serve as the medical director of the program, and he came before the men in his home and confessed this to them, asking if they would allow him to stay.
PeeWee, a client who had recently been in an argument with Hilfiker, responded with an “unpitying acknowledgement of vulnerability.”
It was difficult for Hilfiker to accept his own brokenness, but this was aided by the overwhelming support from people who had struggled through their own woundedness.
The talk concluded with a question and answer time. One audience member asked, “How can we as Christians, who don’t want to do what you do, do something?”
Hilfiker’s response was, “We don’t know folk.” He reiterated the importance of solidarity with the poor for our own healing. He said it didn’t matter how we got to meet them, whether it be through volunteering or by going to a church with a congregation from various socio-economic levels. We need to know folk.
|
