Stories

In California now, we tell ourselves a lot of stories: the late-baby-boomer autonomy-loving story; the Silicon Valley lonely entrepreneur story; the techno-optimist libertarian story; the rags-to-riches movie and music star story; the go-west-and-discover-yourself story; the immigrant pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps story; even the Napa Institute culture-war Catholic story.

But the unhoused person living on the street for two years has no part in these stories. We need a new story in which we are bound in love and justice to the tens of thousands of persons living and dying on our streets.

David DeCosse, director, religious and catholic ethics, published in National Catholic Reporter.