The failure to build enough affordable housing is symptomatic of a low-expectations society hoping for problems to go away instead of solving them.
Housing
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
L.A. and the sacred dream of suburbia, captured by D. J. Waldie
D. J. Waldie’s strikingly beautiful book in 1996 about what it was like to grow up in Lakewood, Calif., “Holy Land,” is one of many writings by this chronicler of Los Angeles’s past and future.
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
I’ve been homeless and served the homeless. Real help starts with listening.
In my 40 years being homeless and working with the unhoused, I have learned that there is no one major reason why people become homeless.
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
When the suburban American dream conflicts with Catholic social teaching
As Catholics, we must seriously consider where and how we live, and try to build sustainable communities with accountability to each other.
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
Criminalizing homelessness is just one more way to ignore the homeless
There is no one solution, including the best-intentioned right-to-shelter policies, that can address the multitude of issues that drive people into homelessness on a daily basis.
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
Landlords should be required to legally justify every eviction.
“Just cause” eviction laws can add a measure of security and predictability to housing markets. They can also correct the power imbalance between large landlords and tenants.
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
Why Catholics should resist NIMBYism
Housing is an extension of people and of the family, and we can’t ignore the need for more housing simply because we don’t want our neighborhoods to change.
Posted inDispatches, Politics & Society
New head of Catholic Charities continues its humanitarian mission at the border and around the United States
Kerry Alys Robinson began her tenure as chief executive of Catholic Charities USA with a visit to agencies along the southwest border. “I wanted to see firsthand what the realities were,” she explained.
Posted inFaith, Faith in Focus
‘Where does Father live?’ We need to rethink housing for parish priests
The rectory is dead. Long live the rectory!
Posted inFaith, GoodNews
A former convent gives adults with autism an independent living option in New York
Young adults with autism have few places to turn when the services they received as children end. This leads many autistic adults to live at home for years with parents who worry for their children as they age.