‘Peace House Community Journal’ Archives
Someone Thought this was a Good Idea
from the series Peace House Community Journal... By MARTI MALTBY Marti Maltby A couple of months ago, one of the community members at Peace House Community crawled under the table where we set out pastries so he could take a nap. A newer volunteer asked if this was okay, and I replied that as long as he was breathing and no one was going to trip over him, we would leave him alone. If sleeping under a table on a cement floor in a noisy room is his best option, who am I to make an arbitrary rule that will take his sleep away? Illustration: Jake Ryan I mentioned this story during a church service recently, and a couple of days later one of PHC’s supporters commented on how uplifting the story was, because it showed how caring we were. Unfortunately, in the two days between telling the story and hearing the comment, my mood had soured because cold weather had set in. My response was succinct. “You say it’s uplifting because I told you about the good part of PHC. The [...]
Timing is Everything
from the series Peace House Community Journal... Illustration: Jake Ryan Marti Maltby I’ve had a hard time settling on a topic for this month’s column. I’m writing this about a week after the election, which is obviously a significant event, and the implications of the election results are big enough that I should probably say something. But you won’t read this until at least a couple of weeks from now because of the production and distribution times involved in publishing the alley. So if I say anything about the election, it will be outdated by the time you see this, at least in some respects. There’s also the fact that I’m Canadian, living in the U.S. as a Permanent Resident without American citizenship. Emotionally, the election doesn’t have the same significance for me as it does for Americans, or for non-Americans with a less secure immigration status than I do. While I and almost everyone I know will be affected by the events of the next few years, I [...]
Meaning What You Say
from the series Peace House Community Journal By MARTI MALTBY Marti Maltby I recently attended a meeting put on by the Minnesota Interagency Council on Homelessness (MICH). As is common these days, the meeting began with a land acknowledgement, which is a statement recognizing that what is now Minnesota was and is the homeland for various Native American tribes. The wording of a land acknowledgement is up to whoever is speaking, or whoever organized the meeting. This particular acknowledgement caught my attention because of some of the language used. The statement read: Today, as we gather virtually, it is of the utmost importance that we all recognize the land we are living and working on is stolen land from our Native American relatives. We must seek to understand our place within that history and use that understanding to work towards justice. The first thing I noticed was the word “stolen”. Of all the land acknowledgments I have heard, this is the strongest [...]
