Angels
House
© 2007 by Tony Hearn
Chapter Twelve
Soooo . . . , I'm going to wind down this tale
concerning the origin and the years of the Angels House soup kitchen. All but
those dull of mind get the jest. In setting up the "program," I was
setting myself up, and those I had encouraged to conspire with me, to violate
common sense. There, really, is no such thing as a free lunch! Somebody has to
pay the tab. As it turned out, the neighborhood surrounding 908 East 1st Street
was footing the bill. The neighborhood, in fact, died. I had brought into a
healthy place a fatal disease. If a person could go back in time to view the
surrounding blocks, that person would see pleasant homes, pleasant streets
directly east of Interstate Highway 35. Surely, it was a less-than-middle class
neighborhood, even a lower-class neighborhood. Check my language; I'm being
precise. With the advent of Angels House, I brought a wave of low-class
individuals (not lower-class, I said low-class, there's a
profound difference) into the area to squat for hours each day. And while they
squatted, they spat, they defecated, they urinated, they littered, they did
their drugs, they left their empty wine bottles, they, hopefully left for a few
hours to panhandle for money for their vices over on Austin's famous Sixth
Street, all so I could, perhaps, provide food for the bellies of a miniscule
portion of this world's authentically needy persons.
And all the while, wealthy and well-intentioned but
dense donors were patting themselves on their backs: "See how nice I am?
I'm supporting the poor!" What they were accomplishing was maintaining the
poor in their dysfunction!
In time, I came to my senses. I decided to close
down the feeding program. I was helped by a certain distraction that occurred
in the wider world. It so happened that a famine broke out in Ethiopia.
Donations to the soup kitchen fell off. I had to scrape together enough money
to continue to buy beans and rice and all things nice.
The Reverend Bethell over at Saint David's had put
in an application for a grant from a national organization of Episcopal women.
I didn't know it, but he had sold them on giving money for, of all things, a
new toilet for the homeless men. Wouldn't you know those Episcopalians were
hung up on the shit that had caused them to un-invite the soup kitchen from
their property many months before?
Well, the money, $7,000, came in. I was called on
the phone to come pick up the check. I did in haste because I was over-drawn at
the bank. I had a number of bills spiked waiting to be paid. The Reverend
Bethell, of course, didn't tell me about building any toilet. He was busy
spreading the word that he had gained a big grant for Angels House. The bottom
line was donors continued to give support to the Ethiopian
"emergency." They forgot about the emergency over across the
interstate at the local soup kitchen. I had personal bills to pay, too. Within
the last few months of Angels House existence as a soup kitchen, I realized the
handwriting was on the wall. The pot began to dry up.
Being the founder of the soup kitchen, I considered
it my right to un-found it. I announced to the three loyal members of the board
of trustees of Angels House, Incorporated, that there was going to be,
imminently, a change in the ministry of the non-profit organization. Angels
House would be shut down at the close of "busyness" at the end of the
month; frankly, I don't recall the actual date.
I called Dabney Cauley to inform him I would no longer
need the use of the building. I also told him I had a ready buyer for the
property. I told him I had in my possession a check for $1,000 as earnest money
for the property with a signed agreement to purchase the property for $90,000,
a profit of $10,000 from the original price when he bought it. Cynthia Perez
wanted to use Angels House to create a place to produce frozen foods to sell in
conjunction with Las Manitas. Mr. Cauley refused the offer. The price of
property in Austin was escalating dramatically. He, apparently, had other
plans. I told him, at any rate, that the soup kitchen was closing down. I shut
the door on free food.
Actually, the Austin branch of the Salvation Army
had earlier opened a new $1 million shelter and kitchen downtown a block east
of Saint David's Church. There was no authentic need of a place for the
indigent to eat elsewhere. There was the "opportunity" for "do
gooders," of course, to feel nice about themselves and how generous they
were toward the poor, unfortunates. These people always want to maintain
the dysfunctional. "See what I'm doing to help others!"
There was no authentic need for a noon meal. Unless,
of course, there existed a "need" for those with a full belly to put
food into the bellies of others who goofed off, sitting on their backsides in
idleness.
Surely enough, within weeks, another person with
stars in his eyes, conceived of reopening the soup kitchen. The person was a
Baptist minister. He approached whoever was put in charge of controlling the
property at 908 East 1st Street. I got wind of it, and I went to see the Rev.
Frank Deutsche, the minister. I told him why I had closed down the soup
kitchen. I told him of the damage the feeding program had created in the
neighborhood. I told him the Salvation Army was meeting the authentic need of
those who were claiming they needed free food. He, of course, didn't listen to
me. He, as I had been earlier, was caught up in a self-delusion of being a
deliverer of the poor, of being God's helper, even though what he was planning
had nothing at all to do with authentically moving people toward
self-sufficiency and becoming part of the Kingdom of God. I stand upon that
conviction, so help me God!