A Halloween Haunting

Halloween - All-Hallows Eve - costumes for the kids and all the fun and games that go along with this national day. And oh, I almost forgot, a Kansas City Chiefs football game on television. All the makings of a great night, or in my case, one that haunts you.

It seemed headed for a good one while walking along with some friends and their kids as they trick-or-treated the local neighborhood. We headed down to a local church, whose congregation gathered for an annual treat in which they decorated the trunks of their cars or the beds of trucks and passed out candy to anyone who came by. It has been going on for years.

A good ole’ fashioned church Halloween, and a way for the congregation to get people to come to the church, pass out literature and possibly connect with the community on a more personal level.

You had the decorated grave yard in a fairly-new Capri trunk and its owner handing out Kit Kats, a strobe-lit casket in the back of a Chevy, complete with Snickers - all the makings of a church outing that helped bring out the best in people.

Then we came across the final car in line. After a read of its sign and a double-take of the occupants in the trunk of the vehicle, it struck me as more than odd.

Two young adults, raggedly dressed with mismatched shoes and socks, holes in their jeans and gloves, happily addressed the children with candy and suckers surrounded by six boxes outside of the vehicle with written signs on them.

One sign, in capital letters, read “HOMELESS” and the other sign “BOX PEOPLE.”

Thoughts raced around my head like the upcoming NASCAR events. Should I ask them why they chose this caricature? Do they know any homeless people? Do they help homeless people? Do they attend this church? Is this a joke?

I watched them for about five minutes while our little trick-or-treaters made their way through the maze of cars and the faces of the men I have seen at Community Missions Corporation (Juda House and St. Joseph’s Haven) came back to me quickly as did the thought of how hard CMC and its sister organizations in St. Joseph work to bring this issue to an end.

I know what St. Joseph does for the homeless, it is a great work in progress. But the thing that haunted me the rest of the evening is that fact that I am not as educated on the plight of the homeless as I want to be in order to help fulfill the mission of CMC. And after further review, I am guessing that neither were these two young people, hanging out the back of a perfectly good car, giving away treats and candy to kids in the parking lot of a church.

And since all they were doing was passing out candy, “dressed” as homeless, I can fairly say they were not advocating for those men and women in that situation. No literature to pass out about the homeless, no brochures or newsletters from those organizations that aid these people, just sitting there in their car, enjoying Halloween.

But, to be fair, giving them the benefit of the doubt, they are probably smart enough to know that whether it be in a car to shelter them from the elements, candy to eat, or at church to hone their faith, any homeless person would be dying to be in their shoes. And some probably did that very evening.