This blog will keep you up to date on what we are doing in the garden at the Urban Ministry Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, USA. You’ll also learn about community gardening and organic gardening, and about the struggle against homelessness and poverty.
Feel free to add your comments and turn this into a more open discussion.
To learn more about the Center and our programs beyond gardening, visit us at:
The Urban Ministry Center is a grassroots program to assist people facing homelessness and poverty. We have a soup kitchen (200-300 meals a day, of late, with growing demand), mail drop service, laundry, counseling and medical support – pretty much everything but overnight housing. We do help people connect with a warm bed and meal in churches during the cold winter months through Room In The Inn. To phone for info, call 704-347-0278 (and be patient, since volunteers answer our phones).
The Center’s gardening and landscaping is part of the Center’s CommunityWorks 945 Program:
CommunityWorks has a beautiful site with lots of dynamic multimedia, designed by John Buckle and Lawrence Cann, great fun to explore. CommunityWorks goes beyond traditional services and counseling to help folks on the street build community and engage with life, knowing they will be treated with dignity, respect and appreciation for their unique gifts and outlook on the world.
Consider – Bartok died in poverty in a cold water flat in New York City, an “alien” immigrant who barely spoke English; Van Gogh was virtually homeless for a time, and sold only one painting in his lifetime; Bird struggled constantly with drug addiction; Thoreau lived in the woods; Hallie Berry lived in a shelter as a young adult when her mom refused to send her money; Ella Fitzgerald on the streets of Harlem – check out this list before passing any judgements:
Famous people who’ve been homeless
CommunityWorks programs include:
Last but not least, of course, there’s the garden program.:
I am very impressed by all the good things that you do. I just moved to Charlotte 2 months ago and I really want to get involved in your projects. Looking forward to meeting you all. The website design is very compelling and draws you in. As a social activist and grant writer, I am happy to see such endeavors thriving in Charlotte. Peace and Joy
Good morning,
I work with a soup kitchen urban farming program in Detroit and we are beginning to have more of the guests from the kitchen become involved in the gardens. I am going to be in Charlotte in May and am excited about the possibility of working and learning from you all. When are the best times to visit and volunteer with you all? I will be in Charlotte from May 22 until May 26. Many blessings.
Peace,
Lisa
Hi, Lisa,
It will be great to see you. I’ll send you more information by email.
Anyone is welcome to come visit or (even better…) volunteer. I’m slowly getting a regular support group going of community volunteers (guerrilla gardeners).
We have four more-or-less linked objectives in our gardening program – giving people a place where they are welcome to garden whatever their life situation, growing food for the community and individuals (delicious, fresh, organic food), setting an ecologically sound and sustainable environmental example in our entire landscape, and creating a beautiful, welcoming and spiritually sustaining place that supports people’s efforts to live in dignity, seek peace, and transform their lives.
Our most basic objective is that of the Center overall, to provide a ministry of presence serving our neighbors who face homelessness and extreme poverty. “Ministry of presence” is a fancy way of saying being there with people, listening deeply without judging or blaming, and working together as good neighbors to meet human needs, connect with resources, and support positive transformation.
We translate this into reality by doing things like planting lettuce, turning compost, painting rubble to create urban art, putting lime down where a few folks insist on peeing in spite of my complaints and at least 8 accessible bathrooms at the Center. We need some kind of port-a-john (or pissoir, like the French use), but I sure wish the edge of the nursery area was less of a target. So to speak. I mean, nitrogen works wonders, but not in the form and location it’s being applied.
So, our garden is where rhetoric and reality meet, check each other out, and sometimes find common ground. Messy and frustrating at times, but ultimately satisfying and hopeful.
Hi, I would like to find out about getting some portion of my church involved in the community garden. I’m a container gardener myself and know others who’d be interested in this project. Please email me.
Thanks.