By Reverend Donna Schaper
There is a Lower East Side Yiddish proverb that goes like this: “Hurry up and eat. We need the tablecloth for a sheet.” This references the way immigrants lived in shifts in small downtown apartments when they first arrived. They showed up. They made do. They became American citizens and enriched the life of our country.
One night last year, at Judson Memorial Church, also downtown and site of the first clean water for immigrants stemming from a fountain often confused for a baptismal, the Muslim Consultative Network, which co-offices with us, was having an impromptu celebration because some of their people had gotten out of Yemen, where Al Qaeda had taken over the airport and the U.S. Embassy had fled. Long sentence, right? Long history too.
The New Sanctuary Movement was training new people for the Accompaniment Program, where we attend deportation and detention proceedings at ICE. ICE is Immigration Control and Enforcement, unspiritual sounding words if there ever were any. They were meeting in the room called the Garden Room, which is the size of a pretty large living room. On one side of this multi-purpose room, women in scarves were hugging and laughing. On the other side, people were speaking in Spanish, going over forms, and preparing cases and documents, which would stop our government from stopping our enrichment as a society.
In the kitchen off the Garden Room, a couple of people were preparing bleach kits, an historic Judson program that promotes clean needles, actively, by hand. In the “couch area,” the Sex Workers Alliance was waiting for the Garden Room to clear out. The Judson Buildings Committee was meeting, uncomfortably, in my large comfortable office. Upstairs in the main meeting room, a new age concert was beginning. They had erected a small tent in the middle of the magnificent space and were going to make music from within it. In the assembly room downstairs, New York University adjunct professors were considering how to protect their freedom as teachers in a very rich place that they help become richer.
I had to take my one private counseling appointment of the evening in our Communication Director’s office—what we often call the man cave—because there was no room in the Inn. It is also a recording studio.
Judson has made a decision to be a 24-7 operation. Some of the people who came in—the musicians this night—paid for the others to have free space. Our decision was not made in Yiddish but in 21st century ecclesiastical practice. If the church saved the arts in the so-called Middle Ages, the arts will save the church in the 21st century. Plus, the artists have a lot to tell us about where Spirit is leading and what Spirit is saying. Nearly 2000 people per week come through our doors. Many don’t even know we are a church.
I love the buzz. I love the nearly open door. I love the mixtures. I love setting a table for the Spirit in the middle of the city. Is there a down side? Yup. The building itself is over-used, hard to maintain, sometimes weary of all the fun inside it. Does the crowding sometimes get to people? Yes. New Yorkers often feel the pinch of public space. We know how to live densely, which is the greenest form of living, if not always the most quiet or serene. Does the church have to pay a lot of staff to keep density from overcoming either the building or its occupants? Yes, we do. These deficits don’t compare to the asset of opening the doors and letting the building show up to the people in the community.
Judson took out its pews in 1959. That fluidity made all the difference. It allowed us to be part parents of Off-Off Broadway and modern dance. It gave some credence to our slogan, “Still Open in Many Ways.” Now we face the need for a new roof and a new lift. We worship on the second floor and we have overused the lift for too many parties. It has to be replaced. We give delayed maintenance new meaning, frequently. On the other hand, we don’t delay mission and use our space as our mission. Our space use policy is to maximize mission and maximize money for mission. We know it is paradoxical. Hurry up and eat. We need the tablecloth for a sheet.
