When we caught up with Monica DeLaurentis, it was still summer in Minneapolis, and she was out in her mission field, doing what she does each week, visiting homeless encampments, praying for people, giving them food, and telling them about Jesus.
She told us, “Most of these people live in encampments, but right now the encampments are being moved and moved and moved and moved, so they find gathering places so it’s a group of people who are homeless. The main problem is mental illness combined with chemical use.”
Monica and her husband Chris, both former addicts, began the Life Center in downtown Minneapolis 33 years ago because they envisioned a more effective way to reach the homeless.
“Most miracles don’t happen in a second. They take years,” said Chris DeLaurentis.
He explained that the most effective transformation for a homeless person is a long-term process. “Most miracles don’t happen in a second. They take years. We realize that it is a long-term process to walk alongside of people, to do life with them, and disciple people. It takes years for them to learn new thoughts, adapt new behaviors,” he said.
Hazel Fernandez told us, “Before I came to the Life Center, I was actually addicted to crystal meth, and I was homeless, living in a tent.” Today, Hazel helps cook and serve 2,000 meals a week for the homeless.
Chris and Monica say America’s homeless problem continues to exist because of a generational cycle of family dysfunction, passed down from parents to children.
Chris said, “We’re dealing with people who’ve grown up in generational welfare, generational poverty.” Monica said, “They’re addicted. Their parents were addicted. Even their grandparents were addicted.”
Sometimes the couple’s mission involves literally bringing an addict back to life with Narcan, an overdose antidote.
Showing us one, Monica said, “This is a Narcan kit, and these are passed out all over the community because of the overdoses that are happening. But this takes (the narcotic) completely out of you. So, sometimes when they wake up, they’re pretty mad, because they didn’t realize they were gonna die.”
The Life Center holds worship services, 12-step groups, and what they call Life Skills discipleship training.
“Some people call us ‘the crack church,’ because that’s where crack addicts go,” Chris said.
The Homeless Remain Unreached, Not Because of a Lack of Churches
For Chris and Monica, the ‘mission field’ is not some faraway place. It’s all around them. People who have been abused, drug addicted, and the hurting.
Monica calls America’s homeless an “unreached people group” living among us, ignored by many churches, because she says the need can look too difficult and dangerous.
“They’re unreached not for lack of churches, because there’s a church on every corner,” Monica said, “but there’s a lack of desire to reach the people that we’re reaching, or they just don’t know what to do. A lot of times, people think you need an ocean dividing you before it’s a mission field. But it’s a mission field here, I promise you. You come down here, and you’re going to feel like you’re in another world.”
Only Jesus Can Truly End the Homeless Crisis
Some 30,000 families have come to Christ through the Life Center over the years.
For now, Minnesota’s warm summer is long gone, replaced by freezing winter temperatures. And while America’s cities have spent millions trying to fix the homeless problem, Chris says money and programs alone will never be enough.
“The government in Minneapolis tries. I go to their meetings. They’re trying to find solutions to the drug epidemic, to the housing crisis,” Chris told us. “But the bottom line is, without a changed mind, without a transformed heart, all we can do is, at best, throw band aids at it, right?”
“But we have just found that Jesus works. The Holy Spirit works.”
