Grappling with Homeless Encampments and Race

The Center for Religious Wisdom & World Affairs’ Puget Sound Network met earlier this month to explore how faith-based organizations engage with tent encampments, and begin to consider how they might better confront the intersection of race and homelessness. 

The group, which included graduate students from the School of Theology and Ministry and key community partners working on homelessness and affordable housing issues, first examined the important role the Ecumenical Support Network played in the recent  decision to relocate Tent City 5 to Port of Seattle land; and then dialogued with Center scholar Laura Stivers about her current research on the intersection of race and homelessness in the San Francisco Bay Area. The group identified some of the unique capacities communities of faith and their organizations bring to these issues, such as elevating the moral dimensions of citizenship and building coalitions across differences.

The Center will be offering a series of professional development courses in 2018 – Building Skills for Faith-Based Community Development – that draw on this ongoing work by Center Scholars and the Puget Sound Network.