My album from the longest night of the year on Sunday, which the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels marked with its annual memorial service for unhoused people who died on the streets of Los Angeles — this year, 1,365 during the 12 months ending Oct. 31. Their names filled 15 pages in the bulletin.
Archbishop José H. Gomez presided and offered a reflection on Jesus’s parable of the Good Samaritan. I was among a small group of interfaith and ecumenical witnesses organized by the archdiocese’s veteran inter-religious officer, Fr. Alexei Smith.
During one of the speeches, by Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Vedanta Society representatives, a woman sitting a few rows behind us shouted out that we needed more legislation to help the unhoused. Cathedral personnel escorted her out.
Yet before she spoke, as I listened to the eloquent testimony, I’d been reflecting on a paradox. The speakers and archbishop were in full accord on humanity’s responsibility to love our neighbor and care for the most vulnerable. Yet in one of the richest cities in the richest nation in history, thousands die every year essentially of exposure. We could get those numbers down, but it would cost money society has until now been unwilling to spend on housing, addiction treatment, and mental illness programs.
So what every religion agrees we must do, we still don’t. One can appreciate why our fellow congregant had grown impatient. Perhaps she knew one of the 1,365 who died or was overcome with impatience that any had. Either way, it was hard to blame her.
