It was about 3 p.m. on Christmas Eve when a woman and her two children sought refuge at the Jimmie Hale Mission in Birmingham.
The woman had been living with her sister, whose boyfriend had been in jail but was granted an early release because of the holidays. When the boyfriend returned to the sister’s house, the sister had to choose who would live with her.
The sister chose her boyfriend.
Thus, the woman and her children were turned out on the street.
Tony Cooper, executive director of the Jimmie Hale Mission, was there that day and heard the woman’s account of how she and her children became homeless. His heart broke.
The shelter’s social worker got on the phone and searched until a place was found for the three, since the mission’s Brother Leo Men’s Center houses only males.
But the episode spurred Cooper to immediate action. At the next meeting of the mission’s board of directors, he implored the members to establish a shelter for women.
It took three years to get Jessie’s Place opened in 1998 on Fifth Avenue North in downtown Birmingham. Jessie’s Place can ac- commodate 30 people (women and their children) and, at times, has reached its maximum capacity, said Cooper. “We stay close to full, if not full, all the time.” Cooper said the need for shelters for women is increasing significantly.
“Women and children are the fastest growing population of the homeless,” he pointed out.
“That’s pretty much a nationwide trend,” added Stephanie Bales, program coordinator for Jessie’s Place.
In 1999, 65 women and 75 children were assisted through Jessie’s Place, said Cooper.
“We need about 20 million more shelters,” stated Anna Fulmer, executive director of Rose Haven in Etowah County. The shelter — which is part of the Alabama Coalition Against Domestic Violence and receives state, federal and local funds — can expect to see about 300 women and children in the shelter each year, in addition to working with approximately 800 in out-of-shelter programs and fielding about 1,000 crisis calls from Etowah, Cherokee and DeKalb counties.
Fulmer believes violence in society can be traced directly to a lost sense of values and an absence of knowledge of God. “There’s lots of anger in the world today.”
Entwined with and springing forth from that moral decay is a breakdown of the family, which fosters a great deal of homelessness, said Elena Aldridge, executive director of King’s Ranch — Hannah Homes, Inc. It operates the Hannah Home in a secret location in Tuscaloosa County and Bethany Home in Birmingham’s Southside.
Dealing with factors that contribute to homelessness — drug abuse, domestic violence, mental illness, being ill-equipped to take care of self and others — and repairing lives involve a number of strategies. Counseling, teaching job skills, providing access to GED classes and offering courses on parenting and managing stress are just a few of them.
But in the shelters operated as Christian ministries, Jesus is invited in to be the center of the healing and mending process. Clients attend Bible studies, which are held daily in some locations, and they go to church.
“We just try to be the hands and feet of Jesus,” said Aldridge. “Only He can change the heart.”
And that, He does.
“We see in some ladies the evidence of change,” said Aldridge. When their lives do change, it is drastic too, she continued.
“We see a lot of professions of faith,” said Bales. “We really see more rededications.”
According to Steve Goebel, director of Lifeline Village in Pell City that provides residential care for girls, about 90 percent of the teens and preteens who stay at its two homes during their pregnancies accept Jesus as their Savior.
Louise Green, director of the Birmingham-area office of the Alabama Baptist Children’s Homes and Family Ministries, told of a significant transformation in the life of a teenage girl.
This girl, Green explained, came — guarded and in shackles — to one of the ministries’ facilities. It was obvious by her demeanor that she didn’t want to be there and didn’t want to go to church.
But as the days passed into weeks at the maternity home, the girl asked Jesus to come into her heart and be her Savior. “It was a dramatic change,” said Green.
Unfortunately, the girl’s baby died prior to birth and the mother had to carry it about a month before it was delivered. Nonetheless, Green said, the girl’s heart had been changed so that she wasn’t bitter against God for what happened.
More lenient Medicaid rules, abortions and acceptance in society of pregnancies outside of marriage mean the demand for the confidentiality of a maternity home has decreased somewhat, said Green and Goebel.
But what has risen is the need for residential care for nonpregnant girls, said Goebel, son of Wales Goebel, who began Sav-A-Life in 1979.
Goebel said Lifeline Village expects to open a home this month, where nonpregnant girls may stay for a minimum of a year in a strict, monitored environment.
The reason for the one-year minimum, he said, is “to spend more time spiritually with the girls.” The girls who live in the maternity homes generally stay an average of only five months.
Aldridge noted that lives are being changed through the work of her shelters, so much so that some of the women now are ministering to and sharing their faith with others. Last year, some of the women went on a missions trip to Charleston, S.C. This month, a group will go to Atlanta.
This, she said, gets them involved in community service and “helps the ladies see they can give back.”
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