I’m going to open my blog with an article in the local weekly paper about me and one thing I work on.

from Mountain Xpress, January 4, 2006

http://www.mountainx.com/news/2006/0104news.php

Filling in the cracks

The Asheville Homeless Network was literally founded on Moss Bliss’s
couch in April of 2004 by Bliss and Gwen Parr (now McCourry), a
homeless acquaintance of Moss’ whom he was letting sleep there.

As Moss explains it, Parr (who has since left the area) had felt that
the existing local organizations helping the homeless weren’t
coordinating their activities effectively or communicating with the
homeless population they were serving.

“There are a lot of problems dealing with the homeless in this town; a
lot of holes, a lot of cracks,” says Moss. “We didn’t want to be
another agency, but we wanted to help fill in the cracks.”

AHN’s members include the homeless, the formerly homeless and their
allies. Among the organization’s goals are: (a) getting information to
the homeless population about what help is available and where; (b)
making information available about their rights and the local laws that
affect them; (c) lining up organizations and churches to help individuals
directly; (d) changing the public’s perception of who the homeless are;
and (e) educating city and county officials about homeless people’s
needs.

A little more than a year-and-a-half later, AHN (whose tag line is
“Helping the Homeless Help Themselves”) already has more than a few
accomplishments under its belt. The group now boasts 63 members, was
recently certified as a nonprofit corporation, has its own Web site
(www.ashevillehomeless.org) that features a wealth of information, has
endorsed candidates for City Council (all of whom have since been
elected), and is part of the Asheville-Buncombe Homeless Coalition.

But those are just baby steps for the group, says Moss. Its longer-term
goals include building or buying a handcart that, once licensed by the
city, would be used to sell handicrafts made by local homeless people;
erecting a “tent city” (with porta-potties and possibly showers) on
surplus city property, to provide low-cost shelter; and encouraging
local shelters to more effectively and humanely meet the needs of the
homeless.

“Some of us have extreme needs [and] some of us have fallen off the
mental-health wagon,” Moss concedes. But “at least half of the homeless
have jobs. They just don’t have good enough jobs to afford housing – to
be able to live anywhere.”

There are a myriad ways people can support the organization, he notes.
Church and civic groups are encouraged to “adopt” a homeless person for
two months through AHN’s Adopt A Homeless Person program. Other needs
include: donations of fabric, yarn, and sewing and knitting supplies
members can use to create handicrafts; camping equipment and bicycles
for a lending library; and storage space for donated items.

Gifts of money can be made directly through the PayPal button on the
Web site or via AHN collection jars (which can be found downtown at the
Grove Corner Market, Vincenzo’s and The Sword & The Grail), and
indirectly by buying items online from one of the group’s affiliated
companies, such as Target, Wal-Mart, Office Depot or Cingular Wireless
(all of which donate a percentage of sales to the organization).

The Asheville Homeless Network holds meetings every Thursday at 2 p.m.,
upstairs in The Perch at the Grove Corner Market in downtown Asheville.
For more information, call 254-7449.

– Lisa Watters

[Note: Only two errors of omission – she spelled Gwenn’s name wrong,
and in the next-to-last paragraph, omitted the fact that you have to go
to our “Our Links” page and click on the Affiliate’s banner there –
which takes you to the Affiliate’s site with a “cookie” – or we don’t
get any credit for the sale.]

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Doing spiritual exercises is not sitting and waiting for God to
obviously come into your field of activity and behavior. It is to go to
God’s activity and field of behavior.  In other words, you make
the effort to reach out. Then that loving, caring, and sharing of
yourself with God in the spiritual form inside, and everywhere you see
it physically, becomes a form of spiritual exercise.
– John-Roger, Walking with the Lord

As a divine being, a Soul, you bring spiritual light and love into this world. You create a space for grace to be in your life.
– John-Roger with Paul Kaye, What’s It Like Being You?

Start living now. Stop saving the good china for that special occasion.
Stop withholding your love until that special person materializes.
Every day you are alive is a special occasion. Every minute, every
breath, is a gift from God.
– Mary Manin Morrissey

… the only time you ever have in which to learn anything or see
anything or feel anything, or express any feeling or emotion, or
respond to an event, or grow, or heal, is this moment, because this is
the only moment any of us ever gets. You’re only here now; you’re only
alive in this moment.
– Jon Kabat-Zinn

We are formed and molded by our thoughts. Those whose minds are shaped
by selfless thoughts give joy when they speak or act. Joy follows them
like a shadow that never leaves them.
– Gautama, called the Buddha

If we had to seek for virtue outside of ourselves, that would assuredly
be difficult; but as it is within us, it suffices to avoid bad thoughts
and to keep our souls turned towards the Lord.
– Philokalia

In the Land of the spirit, you cannot walk by the light of someone
else’s lamp. You want to borrow mine. I’d rather teach you how to make
your own.
– Anthony de Mello

The search for truth is but the honest searching out of everything that
interferes with truth. Truth is. It can neither be lost nor sought nor
found. It is there, wherever you are, being within you. Yet it can be
recognized or unrecognized.
– from A Course In Miracles

Once there is a certain degree of Presence, of still and alert
attention in human beings’perceptions, they can sense the divine life
essence, the one indwelling consciousness or spirit in every creature,
every life-form, recognize it as one with their own essence, and so
love it as themselves.
– Eckhart Tolle

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Today is a day for celebration. Today is a day to be joyful. It is a
day to accomplish great things. It is a day to learn, to love, and to
live the richness that is your life.

Today is a day to rejoice in your good fortune. It is a day to hold
your head up, to stand up straight, to look positively forward and to
smile with such genuine intensity that good and wonderful things are
drawn to you like a magnet.

Today is a day to be confident and purposeful. It is a day to get
things done and to move the whole world forward with your enthusiasm.

What makes this day so special? Today is your day to enjoy, experience
and make the very best of the most precious gift you have — your life.
The possibilities are endless and those possibilities are all yours,
here, now, in this moment.

Celebrate your good fortune. Just think how incredibly blessed you are
to live this precious life and to be in a position, right this very
moment, to make it even better.

– Ralph Marston