St. Francis House - Columbia, MO

House shifts happen twice a day at St. Francis House. The morning when breakfast is served with coffee from 7-9 and dinner dinner from 7 to 9. Sunday is the exception when a noon lunch is substituted for breakfast.

Most folks coming for a meal grab it to go, sometimes a couple for family or friends. To-go meals is a practice started during the pandemic. 

 

But other folks choose to come in, vaccination required. They can eat their meal sitting at the large wooden dining room table where there’s always plenty of day-old desserts and bread around as well as fresh fruit, peanut butter and jelly and other snacks. There’s a bathroom for folks to use and some even take a shower. 

As with many CW houses there are some folks who enjoy just coming in and having a seat on one of the couches in the living room to enjoy some relaxation and friendly chatter.

The person “on house” is generally responsible for the meal. But at St. Francis House they get a ton of ready to eat food donated. Sometimes it comes from religious groups who bring meals regularly but other times it arrives in the form of left overs from events, often from the nearby University of Missouri. Many years the football program will give St. Francis left overs from the team’s meals! You wouldn’t believe (or maybe you would) the food those guys get.

St. Francis House also provides overnight housing to a couple of folks who otherwise wouldn’t have a steady place to stay. This used to be a larger project before the pandemic but continues for now on a smaller scale. The process for homeless folks staying at the house includes an informal interview. The CWs don’t care so much how it is you got in the spot your in but want to know that you can communicate honestly about where it is you want to be going and how you’re going to get there.

 

I had the opportunity to sit in on St. Francis’s community meeting. Held every two weeks, it was quick and to the point. Going through the community’s schedule for the next period, signing up for house shifts, “How are the live-in guests doing?”, a lot of the usual CW concerns. They only met for 20 or 30 minutes.

Recently the park across the way from the Worker house has been a hot spot for illegal opiod sales and use. The community has made the decision not to serve folks who hang out over there. Not long before my visit they had someone who needed to be NARCANed on their front porch. Yikes!

On the other side of the building sits Columbia College. The CW’s smoking porch overlooks the schools sports field. Sometimes this means you get some free entertainment in the form of soccer or lacrosse games while you have a cigarette but mostly it means that the glow of the huge field lights, flooding the property with artificial day time until late into the evening.

 

There don’t seem to be any daily community prayer routine but St. Francis does hold religious services regularly at the house. Often times this is Catholic but other chrisitian denominations are represented as well. Steve told me they have a handful of times a year to invite religious leaders from the local muslim and Jewish communities as well. On weeks where there isn’t an outside prayer leader scheduled the community hosts a movie night where they watch a documentary film followed by a discussion.

more photos of St. Francis House