An Oasis on Kensington Avenue

By Mike Byrne

Some people look on the homeless and addicted as being undesirable or less than human. Even think they are deplorable.

A couple of Franciscan friars, Father Roderic Petrie and Brother Emmet Murphy, viewed them with compassion and treated them with the dignity with which God imbued them.

Emmet Murphy, a Franciscan brother since 1954, was living in a large Franciscan community in Boston when he decided to move to a smaller community where a handful of Franciscans were working with low income people on the edge of society.

This was in the late 1970’s and Brother Emmet was sober from alcoholism for almost five years.

Fr. Petrie was in charge of the smaller community in East Boston and informed Emmet he had no room for him, but he wanted to start a soup kitchen for the homeless in either Newark, NJ, or Washington, D.C., or Philadelphia. Fr. Petrie informed Emmet that when he made his decision he would call him.

Fr. Petrie picked Philadelphia and both Franciscans traveled to the St. John’s Hospice on Race Street, which was near Chinatown. This was 1979.

St. John’s was not near Kensington Avenue, which had been a working class neighborhood before factories and industry moved away. Homelessness, drug addiction and crime moved in.

The Franciscans found a suitable building on Kensington Avenue which they purchased for $9,000. The money came from their Franciscan Province.

Trade unions, plumbers, electricians and contractors made the place suitable and the St. Francis Inn opened its doors in December, 1979.

Before the facility was ready, Brother Emmet continued working at St. John’s Hospice where there were 35 beds available for the homeless.

One very cold night, a young man became so irate when he was told no bed was available for him that he knocked out three teeth from Brother Emmet’s mouth.

Emmet, who was ordained a Franciscan priest in 1986, said the man returned a couple of years later and apologized and asked for forgiveness and made amends to him after becoming sober. He said he was raised a Christian but drugs took him down another path.

The St. Francis Inn served 29 meals the first night, and eventually grew to where they were serving 400-500 meals a night.

The placed operates like a restaurant where guests are seated at tables and served their meals by volunteers.

Guests are supplied with a hot meal and dessert, and some hygiene items such as soap, deodorant, toothpaste, combs and the like are available.

They are also provided with connections for housing and employment, and treatment for addiction.

There are no government funds involved. Volunteers, which sometimes includes high school girls from as far away as Connecticut, help prepare and serve the meals. Donations of money, food and other items come in to the facility from charitable people.

A handful of Franciscans are assigned there full-time, and live in a building nearby.

After the guests are all served, volunteers clean up the kitchen and put things away.

Upstairs there is a room where the volunteers gather with the Franciscans and attend a Catholic Mass and Communion. Afterwards, they go to an adjoining dining room and have a meal, just like the one served the guests.

The facility is open every day to help the homeless and addicted on Kensington Avenue.

Father Emmet, who will be 91 in September, said now the area is becoming gentrified. Developers are buying buildings and houses and refurbishing them, so eventually the homeless and addicted will be squeezed out of the area.

And the rough Kensington Avenue section will undergo a change.

The homeless and the addicted will move on, however.

Fr. Emmet said the St. Francis Inn, or someplace similar, will move on with them.

?