Report from Bethel Ministries Shelter

This is the scene at Bethel Ministries where about 60 Katrina evacuees are staying. The building is less than 2 miles from our church campus. We have taken on the task of organizing volunteers to prepare, serve and clean up lunch and dinner every day for the forseeable future. Today my team was there fixing lunch.

All of the people in this shelter are part of a large extended family. The matriarch of the family, who is with them, had 14 children--then they had children, in-laws, etc. You get the idea. They came here because they have a relative in the immediate area. At lunch there weren't very many folks there. All the children are already enrolled in school and most of the adults were out getting medical assistance, getting signed up for social security, food stamps, employment, housing etc. We made enough lunch and then some for everyone and left it out so the late-comers could pick it up later. Leftovers will be saved for the weekend lunches.

One of the women was constantly on her cellphone, checking out leads for housing and employment. Several elderly women are in the group. One is diabetic and so we looked for some sugar free items for her. Two of them are bedridden and are staying in a trailer on the property. We have several medical professionals in the congregation checking on them daily.

One of the men came into the kitchen to chat with us. It turns out he was a cook on the Mississsippi Queen before Katrina. He plans to make gumbo and pork chop cassarole for the group this weekend and gave us his professional tips on making shrimp and lobster pasta ( boil your pasta in the broth you used to cook the shrimp or lobster). Clearly he is starting to get antsy away from work. We assured him that with his skills, there were plenty of jobs available in Houston which is a big restaurant town.

If you look in the back of the picture you will see piles and piles of donated clothing behind the mattresses and cots on the floor. Bethel has stacks and stacks of water, diapers and baby supplies and donated food stored in their sanctuary building. In fact they have had to throw away prepared food that was brought to them because they didn't have room to refrigerate it. This is a common in all the shelters in the Houston area--not just at the Astrodome, Reliant Center and Brown Convention Center. This is why gift cards that can be used to buy gas or other necessities are so useful.

I hope these folks find more suitable temporary or permanent housing in the next couple of weeks. It's hard to live in a shelter, with its loss of privacy and control. But if they're still there a month from now, we will be too.