Outreach: At Work in the Community and the World

• Midnight Run

  Midnight Run is a volunteer organization dedicated to finding common ground between the housed and the homeless.

  Midnight Run coordinates over 1,000 relief missions per year, in which volunteers from churches, synagogues, schools and other civic groups distribute food, clothing, blankets and personal care items to the homeless poor on the streets of New York City. The late-night relief efforts create a forum for trust, sharing, understanding and affection. That human exchange, rather than the exchange of goods, is the essence of the Midnight Run mission.

  Midnight Run is not a solution to homelessness. Our goal is to forge a bond between housed and homeless people by establishing a foundation of sharing and caring from which solutions may evolve. Through Midnight Run, volunteers come to see people on the streets as real people, not a commodity. And homeless men and women interact with mainstream adults and teenagers whose commitments and concerns go beyond their own lives and families.

  
  

  Volunteer Testimonial

  I really enjoyed attending the midnight runs. I helped out a couple times in high school and college, and was planning to get more involved this year before covid hit. I think I did go out on one run in 2019 or early 2020.
  
  For me, the best part of the night is getting to chat with people and hear what they are going through. It always grounds me to hear people's stories, and I try to talk to people at every stop if I have time. I've listened to people explain the arduous process of seeking shelter and benefits, and the threats they face in homeless shelters that force them onto the streets. I spoke with a construction worker, as we both held cups of hot chocolate, who has travelled the country following jobs, but can't afford a place to stay in the city for the 2 months he was there, due to the high costs of housing. One man, an opera aficionado, broke into song during a stop. Some people are obviously mentally ill (like many of my family and friends) but unlike the people in my social circles, they cannot afford therapy and medicine. Pretty much everyone I met was generous, respectful and patient.
  
  The level of solidarity between homeless people is incredible. I remember once, a lanky black man with a scruffy beard asked me if he could take extra clothes and food, for a friend. I said sure, and he grabbed so much that I asked if he needed help carrying it. Together, we walked 3 blocks away, to a young woman who was missing both her legs below the knees. She was sleeping on a long piece of thick cardboard on the stoop of a church, with other pieces of cardboard around her blocking the wind. The man gently woke her up, and offered her clothes and food, for which she was very grateful. She told me about her struggles getting healthcare, and having to sleep on the streets with a painful infection in her leg, during a cold NY winter. It was so cold that night that some of the volunteers struggled to stand outside during the 15 minute stops.
  
  Every time I went to a midnight run, I left with a greater conviction that the capitalist system is a cruel, negligent sham. We choose to have a system where people are forced to sleep on pieces of cardboard on damp, cold, windy streets. We need to end homelessness, hunger and untreated illness, and the only real way to do this is through universal access to housing, food and healthcare. No woman, man or child (and there are many children) should be forced to sleep in the cold. This is not a blameless problem: the culprits of homelessness are the rich and powerful and the politicians who represent them. Like 5 year old kids, the wealthy of our country need to stop hoarding and learn how to share.
  
  Midnight Run is an incredible program that benefits so many New Yorkers. I feel that the politics of homelessness is inseparable from the experiences of the homeless -- we cannot be angry at homelessness without also raging against the system that forces people into it. I hope stories like mine can help bring more volunteers to this incredible program!

  In non-Covid times: We meet at the Presbyterian Church, Irvington kitchen at 6:45 p.m. to help prepare about 125-150 sandwiches until about 8:30 p.m. Then, we move over to the next-door St. Barnabas Episcopal Church fellowship hall to pack food, snacks, beverage, personal items and clothing until 9, after which we pack the cars and travel down to designated stops in Manhattan, assigned by Midnight Run HQ. In NYC, we distribute food and clothing to the homeless people who come to meet us. We typically return around 1:00 a.m.
  Teenagers figure prominently in this ministry with adults along to help out.
  Please contact Lynne Shafer for more info.
  
  A “Midnight Run” box is in the narthex for much appreciated donations. Please save and donate travel-size toiletry items and/or dark-color backpacks or carry bags to our Midnight Run.

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