My Newest Hero!

Did you know that in many American cities it is illegal to give a homeless person food?  You could become a criminal if you so much as roll your window down and hand a Kit Kat chocolate bar to an indigent Veteran begging for work at an intersection.  This completely incenses me.  Of all the shit that needs to be flushed in this country, feeding hungry citizens who don't even have a place to sleep is insane.

Conservative, mostly Republican city counsels and mayors have passed this legislation--but not exclusively--not by far.  I won't call any of them Christian, because apparently persecuting homeless people in the most fundamental and life-threatening way is justified in their minds.  It doesn't jive with Christ's thought, "I tell you truly, in so far as you did it to one of these my brothers, even to the least of them, you did it to me." - (Matthew 25:40b) either.  How it is that the majority of citizens in these cities who ARE Christians accept and vote for representatives who pass immoral laws like this is beyond me.  The list includes a lot a big cities (Here's a partial list):

ALABAMA: Birmingham

ARIZONA: Phoenix

ARKANSAS: Little Rock

COLORADO: Denver

CALIFORNIA: Los Angeles, Pasadena, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, Ventura

FLORIDA: Daytona Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Gainesville, Jacksonville, Miami, Orlando, Sarasota, St. Petersburg, Tampa, West Palm Beach

GEORGIA: Atlanta

INDIANA: Indianapolis

IOWA: Cedar Rapids, Davenport

MARYLAND: Baltimore

MISSOURI: Kansas City, St. Louis, Springfield

NORTH CAROLINA: Charlotte, Raleigh

NEW HAMPSHIRE: Manchester

NEW MEXICO: Albuquerque

NEVADA: Las Vegas

OHIO: Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dayton

OKLAHOMA: Oklahoma City

OREGON: Portland

PENNSYLVANIA: Philadelphia

SOUTH CAROLINA: Columbia, Myrtle Beach

TENNESSEE: Chattanooga, Nashville

TEXAS: Corpus Christi, Dallas, Houston

UTAH: Salt Lake City

WASHINGTON: Olympia, Seattle

Dove tail this into the latest conservative craze: Religious Freedom Laws.  These laws allow people to void other laws IF those laws go against their strongly held religious beliefs.  They are primarily aimed at allowing "Christians" to persecute Gay Americans by denying them access to goods and services provided by these "Christian" people.  Without this law, such persecution would be a hate crime and they would be in deep doo doo.  But the rub is that they don't admit to this in the laws.  The laws are written in such a generic way to allow this outcome without preventing other outcomes and interpretations.  If they were written as intended they would be patently UNCONSTITUTIONAL. 

Enter one good Samaritan named Joan Cheever.   She is my new HERO.  Here is her story.

Joan Cheever, a San Antonio woman who’s been feeding the homeless for the past decade, is arguing that Texas’ religious freedom law should protect her from the $2,000 fine she’s facing for her charitable work. Cheever was cited by police last week for handing out food in a local park. She argues the Religious Freedom Restoration Act legalizes her activities. 

According to the San Antonio Express News, which we saw via Raw Story, Cheever, a chef, runs a nonprofit food truck called the Chow Train, promising healthy, gourmet meals to the hungry. She says she’s been feeding people at Maverick Park since 2005 without incident, until last week, when four bike patrol officers ticketed her for providing food out of a vehicle other than her food truck.

Cheever told WOAI she believes that both the Constitution’s provisions on free exercise of religion as well as Texas’ fifteen-year-old Religious Freedom Restoration act—enacted well before it became a national trend—should protect her feeding the homeless. She claims the police disagreed: “One of the police officers said, ‘Ma’am, if you want to pray, go to church,’ And I said, ‘This is how I pray. When I cook this food and deliver it to the people who are less fortunate.”

Cheever’s citation carries a fine of up to $2,000. Her court date is in June; she’s said she’ll cite the RFRA in her defense.

Unlike, say, homosexuality or abortion, Jesus had a great deal to say about feeding the hungry. From Matthew 25: 

Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

Presumably, though, when Jesus handed out loaves and fishes during his speaking engagements, he had all the proper permits in place.