The world never ceases to amaze me. Here's what just happened to me:
Part of the grade in the class that I am in right now is based on a certain mandatory number of hours of community service that each student must perform. These community-service hours needn't necessarily be for a faith-based organization, but should be done for some community-building effort. A couple weeks ago I read about the Dallas Street Church in the good ol' [i:8ee1d80e73]Dallas Observer[/i:8ee1d80e73] and went to check it out; I drove out there this afternoon:
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www.dallasobserver.com]
This looks to me to be an example of a "good", non-abusive, grassroots, community-building ministry that is focused on ministering to the homeless population in Dallas. I'm going to do my community service hours for class there and more than likely will continue to volunteer with them after the class is over. They're doing what appears to me to be a variation on the Dallas Project over there, finding housing for the homeless and building their ministry at the same time.
While I was down there I was talking to a man who was working around the place, giving him my contact information and all that, and at one point he asked me about any pertinent experience I may have,
professional skills, volunteer experience, stuff like that. I mentioned the Army, and mentioned having worked with TFI. The guy's eyes met mine when I mentioned the name of Trinity Foundation, and I saw recognition in his eyes. I hastened to add that I left after about five months when I figured out that TFI is a destructive cult. He said that he'd heard of TFI and he'd heard that they're a "bad group" too, and that he'd been warned about associating with them. I was a little surprised, though I shouldn't have been.
Here was a guy deep in South Dallas (for y'all not familiar with Dallas that is the straight-up 'hood) doing street-level, grassroots work for and with the homeless in that community, and even HE told me that "word on the street" is that TFI is a dangerous group and that they do not work with nor refer persons to TFI. So here is PROOF that word has gotten out. Even in the trenches so to speak, they know about The Columbia Bunch. Even advocates for the homeless in Dallas avoid them now.
Makes me sad in a way, that OA is such a phony, but happy and hopeful also to know that somebody in this city, (which is notoriously bad and even, I'd say, borderline abusive toward it's homeless) is out there doing something immediate and practical to help the poorest among us. I look forward to working with them in the future.