November 11, 2004 | Read Time: 2 minutes
Street Saints: Renewing America’s Cities
by Barbara J. Elliott
Barbara J. Elliott’s “street saints” are people of every race, class, and religion who use their faith to revitalize neighborhoods and reduce the suffering of others. Ms. Elliott, founder of the Center for Renewal, in Houston, which helps religious groups that provide social services, chronicles the stories of such people and discusses what she believes is the appropriate role of government in supporting their work.
Her book profiles members of the “armies of compassion” and the programs they have inspired. She tells how Cordelia Taylor, frustrated by the quality of care for poor elderly people, founded a
nursing home in an inner-city neighborhood of Milwaukee. In San Antonio, Freddie Garcia, a former heroin addict, started a program for drug abusers that has a success rate of 70 percent.
Ms. Elliott argues that programs like Kids Hope USA, a Michigan group that pairs churchgoers with elementary-school students considered most at risk of dropping out, and Resources, a job-training program founded by a priest in New York, tackle some of society’s most intransigent problems.
The programs incorporate religion into their operations in different ways, Ms. Elliott says: Some are “faith-silent” and discourage proselytizing, while others are “faith-saturated.” For instance, the InnerChange Freedom Initiative, founded in Texas, immerses prison inmates in scripture study, and provides them with mentors, academic activities, and training in the skills they need to live on their own.
The Bush administration’s efforts to help religious groups have reduced some of the barriers to religious groups’ participation in civic life, says the author, but she warns that groups that rely too heavily on federal money may lose their spiritual character. For religious groups to be able to include their beliefs in their work, Ms. Elliott says, private donors must step in to support the organizations.
Publisher: Templeton Foundation Press, 300 Conshohocken State Road, Suite 550, West Conshohocken, Pa. 19428; (484) 531-8380; fax (484) 531-8382; tfp@templeton.org; http://www.templetonpress.org; 320 pages; $24.95; I.S.B.N. 1-932031-76-6.
