Insight from the Author

My motivation to write this book stems from my insight that spiritual prin­ciples and ancient and contemporary spiritual practices should be inten­tionally integrated into efforts to solve social struggles. I came to this belief through personal and professional experience.

Throughout this book, I share my experiences of discovering— or rediscovering—biblically rooted spiritual principles and practices as I worked with others to address community challenges, including homeless­ness, housing discrimination, and neighborhood disinvestment. As our collective journey unfolded, and at the suggestion of a spiritual director, I began to develop a “rule of life” that included practices such as lectio divina, the Divine Office of Prayer, and the daily examen.

My spiritual life evolved along with my professional life and my in­volvement in what at first appeared to be secular activities—participating in community coalitions; creating new coalitions; and completing many homelessness affordable housing and neighborhood disinvestment assess­ments and strategies for communities, cities, and counties. I also worked on assessments and strategies that focused on ending housing and land-use discrimination as well as on economic reinvestment in small businesses. In the midst of these efforts, I worked with others to draft recommendations based on community data generated from locally crafted surveys, focus groups, and federal, state, county, and city sources, which we included in our assessments and strategies to address these social wrongs.

I then worked with others to develop residential and nonresidential programs for people experiencing homelessness. We also developed af­fordable housing projects and established sidewalk vending districts and kitchen incubators for small food-based businesses. I wrote many federal, state, and local grant applications each year that secured funds to help carry out the recommendations.

The more I engaged in these activities, the more I felt the need to in­tegrate spiritual principles and practices with my efforts to help solve social struggles. For years I had crafted a rule of life that helped me cultivate an intimate, personal, and private relationship with God and loving relation­ships with family, friends, and coworkers. As I continued to engage with the issues I cared so deeply about, I discovered that my work had taken on a sacred dimension.

I began to see the urban world as my monastery. The idea for this book emerged from my experiences and zeal to continuously revise my rule of life to meet contemporary urban challenges by integrating principles and practices into my unceasing efforts to work with community partners to encounter, engage, and end social problems and injustices. Thus, my rule of life evolved into anintegrated rule of life.

I was also motivated to familiarize myself with the efforts and accom­plishments of social reformers of the past, many of whom remain unknown to (or are forgotten by) those who seek to advance social justice today. This oversight has left us poorer in our current efforts. Among the many reform­ers I read and studied was Jacob A. Riis, who exposed the horrible living and working conditions of poor immigrants in New York City through his journalism and photography in the late nineteenth century. Because of Riis’s leadership, health and sanitation laws were passed and enforced as philanthropic organizations and special commissions investigated the abuses revealed by his photographs. The city adopted housing codes that required fire escapes, windows, toilets, and running water. Existing housing was upgraded or razed, depending on current conditions. By the time he died in 1914, Riis was known as the “Emancipator of the Slums.”

I was also inspired by the social reformer Nellie Bly, a pioneer of in­vestigative journalism. She posed as a mental health patient in a women’s boarding house and a mental asylum in New York City and wrote about her horrendous experiences of cruel beatings, ice-cold baths, and forced meals filled with spoiled and vermin-infested foods. Her stories created an uproar in New York and were syndicated throughout the country, spurring a national outcry that catalyzed mental healthcare reforms throughout the United States.

I was also deeply inspired by the work of Martin Luther King Jr., whose preaching and leadership of nonviolent protests during the civil rights movement led to decisive legislative gains in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. In turn, these gains helped shape later legislation, including the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.

— Joe Colletti