By DEXTER DUGGAN
SAN DIEGO – Homeless people are more open to recognizing their need for God than members of the general public are, a director of a Catholic street ministry of evangelization told The Wanderer as he took a break from his job as a patent attorney downtown.
Steve Beuerle, 48, central San Diego Director of St. Paul Street Evangelization, said he can hand out more religious objects in a short time where the homeless congregate than at popular locations here where people don’t have such material want, such as a famous local park or a historic sailing ship that became a maritime museum on San Diego Bay.
“I can distribute more Miraculous Medals and rosaries in 20 minutes . . . than two hours at a table at Balboa Park or the Star of India,” Beuerle said about their receptivity. “. . . They’re more open” because of their need.
He said some homeless gather in the East Village neighborhood, near the bay and the major-league Petco baseball park of the San Diego Padres.
After The Wanderer cited the Bible about providing for material needs of the poor, Beuerle named other charitable endeavors he also engages in, as well as pointing to the work of groups such as the local Burrito Boyz, a non-profit for the homeless that, he said, has served nearly 100,000 meals since it began earlier in this decade.
St. Paul Street Evangelization, a national organization, has about 10 team leaders in San Diego with about five members in each team who show up to participate or observe, he said.
The organization doesn’t engage in aggressive proselytization but makes its members available to engage with passers-by. Its website (streetevangelization.com) says:
“Founded in May 2012, St. Paul Street Evangelization provides the tools and resources for Catholics to engage the culture in a simple, non-confrontational method of evangelization which involves making themselves available to the public to answer questions about the faith and to pray with those who request it. SPSE has had tremendous growth and now has teams throughout the United States and even internationally, such as in the Philippines and Australia.”
The organization “provides an avenue for people to share the Person of Jesus Christ and the truth and beauty of the Catholic Faith with a hungry culture,” the website says, adding that there are more than 300 chapters worldwide.
It also says: “Our street teams have shared the Gospel with tens of thousands of people and thousands have become Catholic or returned to the Catholic Church. Our non-confrontational approach is welcomed by communities all over the world. St. Paul Street Evangelization is not an apologetics ministry. Instead, we build bridges of trust with our communities and help people encounter Jesus Christ and His Church through listening, friendship, prayer, and proclamation.”
One San Diego woman told The Wanderer of seeing an evangelizer with a chess board set up at a table along the sidewalks of Balboa Park to draw the potential interest of pedestrians for a game and some conversation.
As he distributes religious objects to the homeless, Beuerle said, he may engage in conversations of three to five minutes. “They’ll tell me about something that happened in their lives . . . or things they’re going through, or if they want prayer for something.”
Because of their situations, he said, “they recognize their need for God, but if they’re in the general public, they don’t recognize their need for God.”
Better-off people have all their followers on Facebook to engage their attention, or 1,000 television channels to watch, he said.
Over the last four years, Beuerle said, the general public “tends to be a bit more hostile to what we’re doing,” while “the majority of passers-by are indifferent, but the majority of the homeless are not indifferent. . . . They have nothing, and they recognize their dependence on others, including God.”
Asked about his other charitable endeavors, Beuerle said they include a Mexican ministry to build houses for the poor in nearby Tijuana, Knights of Columbus charities, and the Light and Life Foundation’s mobile pregnancy centers.
The pregnancy vans make stops at high schools, malls, and beaches, he said.
There’s no way to tell how many people who contact the street evangelizers decide to enter or return to the Catholic Church, he said. “We’re kind of planting the seeds,” but don’t have a way to stay in touch.
Generally, the evangelizers can set up where they want on public land by giving advance notice, but without having to request permission, because they’re not selling anything or creating a problem, Beuerle said.
Experience isn’t required to join the evangelization teams, although training is provided. “We don’t get in a lot of deep theological or catechetical conversations,” but hand out pamphlets, Bibles, CDs, religious items, display fetal models, and offer to pray, he said.
One challenge the evangelizers face is that their younger members “get married, start having kids,” and have less free time, Beuerle said. But “it’s a good problem to have, fulfilling their vocational call” as a married couple.
Beuerle told The Wanderer that he moved from Detroit to San Diego in 1997, and thinks that about four years ago he learned about St. Paul Street Evangelizers through a Catholic media outlet.
“I enjoy doing it. I think there’s a need and a demand for it, and I enjoy filling that demand,” he said. “I would like to get out more often with the tables,” but he has full-time work as an attorney.
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