Angeles mission a home to the homeless

By Yvonne Villarreal
December 13, 2008

Each night before bed recently, Antonio Ruiz has slipped into the same grubby sweat shirt and tattered thermal pants. His long salt-and-pepper hair tied back, he cozies into his sheets and thanks God for giving him "just one more day" -- but he does so quietly, trying not to wake the men sleeping nearby in cots just like his.

The beds are lodged between the pews and crammed into the hallways at Dolores Mission Catholic Church near downtown, which on Friday commemorated 20 years of opening its doors as a shelter for homeless men, particularly illegal immigrants.

"All I was thinking was this is a place to sleep and shower," said Ruiz, 50, who learned of the shelter from a friend. "From the very beginning -- the very beginning -- they made me feel like a person, not an outcast."

The Boyle Heights church began the shelter as a sanctuary for immigrants in 1988, at a time when thousands of Salvadorans were fleeing the civil war in their country and seeking refuge in the United States. The war eventually ended, but the need for shelter has remained in the church's largely Latino neighborhood, its pastor said.

"It's one of the poorest parishes in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles," said Jesuit Father Scott Santarosa. "You would think it'd be the least likely candidate to open its doors to let men stay in it. But in the early days, it was the parishioners' dedication to these men that kept it going. That's true even today. There was need for it 20 years ago; there will be need for it 10 years from now."

On Friday, the mission marked the anniversary with singing, a predawn Mass and a menudo breakfast for several hundred, served on the church plaza. The celebration coincided with the feast day for Our Lady of Guadalupe, which commemorates the account of the Virgin's appearance to Saint Juan Diego near Mexico City. Santarosa called the joint festivities a fitting reminder of the homeless men he likened to Diego, the peasant the Virgin of Guadalupe is said to have chosen to relay her message.

In the early years, the immigrants slept on the narrow pews of the small church. But those hard surfaces were replaced with softer beds in the late 1990s, when the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority began providing funds to the church and required that the men sleep on folding cots.

The Guadalupe Homeless Project, run by the nonprofit Proyecto Pastoral, now shelters a maximum of 55 men, with 28 inside the church and the rest in the parish community room and garage, said Raquel Roman, the program's director. Most of the men are Latino immigrants, 20% of whom have typically just arrived in the United States, she said.

Miguel Suaste, 45, arrived at the church's weathered steps in September 2007, shortly after he came to the U.S. Originally from Mexico, he found it difficult to find a job and had no place else to go, he said.

"They gave me so much more than just a roof over my head," Suaste said. "They gave me support and friendship. I went from being in hell to feeling alive and liberated."

Today, Suaste works at a nearby store, earning minimum wage. Although he no longer seeks services from the program, Suaste has remained involved with the church.

"I think of myself as a person who fights," Suaste said. "I like to believe I would have eventually found my way on my own . . . but it would have been so much harder. It's all because of this place -- my home, these people, my family."

The men staying in the shelter begin their day at 4:45 a.m., followed by breakfast at 5 a.m. About 6 a.m., they make their way to work or are taken to day labor centers or clinics. They can return to the church at 4 p.m. to shower, meditate or watch television until 6:30 p.m., when dinner is served in the dining room at Dolores Mission Catholic School in front of the church.

For more than six years, Diana Martinez, 38, has helped prepare some of those meals, including albondigas, ormeatball soup, and chicken and rice. "The Lord's mission tells us not just to read the Gospel but to put it into practice," Martinez said. "That means giving food to those who are hungry, clothes to those who are cold. I do what I can."

The program, which allows participants to stay a maximum of 90 days, gives the men breakfast and dinner, helps them search for jobs and provides services such as transportation, English classes and a variety of workshops. It also encourages the men to explore their spirituality through religious activities.

"I'm sad my time here is almost over," Ruiz said as he gripped a hot cup of champurrado, a chocolate-based Mexican drink. "This was my family for 2 1/2 months. It is more than a shelter. It's been my home."

Then Ruiz, wearing scuffed construction boots, geared up to leave that home and head to work.

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