Holy Names

Holy Names

Sometimes I think she comes each morning to Manna House just to hear her name.  She never needs much in the clothing room, and she never gets a shower and a change of clothes.  Her greatest delight seems to be when she hears her name. 

She hears her name when she’s greeted at the front door or in the living room.  She hears her name when she’s called for “socks and hygiene.”  And she hears her name one last time as she leaves, “Good bye Miss Linda.  I hope you have a good day.”   

            Each time she hears her name, she smiles.  She never says much; just smiles.  I love her smile.  It slightly creases her face, makes little wrinkles appear around her eyes, and suggests her satisfaction with being known at Manna House.

            Maybe I should have been a doorman at a hotel.  One of my favorite jobs at Manna House is standing at the front gate, and greeting people as they arrive, and wishing them a good day as they leave.  Some arrive ready to smile; others arrive a bit grumpy.  All appreciate being called by name, or at least acknowledged with a “Good morning.”

            Something similar happens when the person working the list calls out guests’ names, when guests are welcomed into the clothing room, or when guests are served coffee.  Greetings are extended and names are said.  Each volunteer also wears a name tag (a piece of masking tape upon which each has written their name).  We get to know our guests by name, and they get to know us by name.

            This is a little practice, this saying of names, but it is a crucial part of our vision at Manna House.  For our guests, we hope to be a place of welcome, where their humanity is recognized, where each person is treated with respect.  We hope to be a place that says to each guest, “Your life matters.”  All of us need welcome, recognition, respect.  All of us need our lives to count for something.  Poverty and homelessness conspire to deny human dignity, to deny respect.  Poverty and homelessness proclaim, “You are worthless and unwanted.  You aren’t a name; you’re nobody.”  When we say names, we mark each other as holy, as persons made in the image of God.

            I got a letter yesterday from a Manna House guest who is now in prison.  He’s not a name where he is; he’s just a number.  And in the midst of that hell he writes of greeting people by name, “Tell Kathleen, Ben, Ashley, and Caitlen and the rest of the volunteers I said hello and thanks for showing me hospitality."  He asked for prayers, “because the devil is coming at me from every angle there is to imagine.”  The devil, the presence of evil in our lives, denies human dignity, denigrates human beings, and tries to get us to be disgusted with one another.  The devil takes away our names and makes us into replaceable numbers. 

            In John’s Gospel, Mary Magdalene doesn’t recognize the resurrected Jesus until he says her name, “Mary” (John 20:11-16).  Resurrection is practiced when we share our names.  Life is restored when we hear our names.  Miss Linda knows this and keeps coming back to Manna House.  And we who serve there come back for the same reason, to share in this place of holy naming.