My name is Eddie Young
I’m from Nashville, the American cradle of songs filled with anguish and despair. After spending 15 years in drug addictions, in an effort to numb an existential dread, I considered the Christian faith as the way forward. I spent the following twenty-something years as a minister in this faith until my work with the homeless communities and the dire, unrelenting poverty of their human condition forced me to abandon the notion of accepting anguish and despair as the prelude to paradise.
I immersed myself into an advocacy position, and then into organizing the homeless community to pursue solution-based dialogue with the stakeholders of the city. In addition to the work of our Homeless Collective, I launched a street newspaper to amplify the voices of those behind the issue. For there to ever be any change, minds have to change. Along the way, I try to be very intentional about my patience for those who’ve never been exposed to the truths that perpetuate and even create homelessness. Until given an alternative perspective, it’s understandable that people will assume to be true what they’ve always been told is true.
I have no patience at all, however, for those who do and or should know better. People in power, neighborhood and business associations, law enforcement, elected officials, service providers, and yes, even some faith-based groups, who pedal myths and lies in order to secure votes, justify their deplorable actions, assuage their guilt, and to keep their shelters in business. It’s these whose minds must be changed, and that has been and will continue to be a formidable task. Along the way, I came to abandon hope in exchange for strategic action.
This blog is intended to educate and collectivize a determination to change minds and to change this tragic course.
