Homeless Families in America Essay -- Homeless Families, 2015

There is not anything quite as satisfying as a good night’s rest before a busy day of school and dance team practice. It is Monday morning, when I crawl out of a comfortable bed of soft-cotton sheets and fuzzy throw blankets. My iHome alarm clock sounds a dreamy melody of ocean tides to wake me from a peaceful slumber. I step into slippers, put together a matching outfit, and grab the New York Times on my way into an all-you-can-eat dining hall. When I relax to a full tray of breakfast, I come upon an ad that makes me feel guilty about my standard of living. The advertisement is not in color, but the creative black font on the page gets my attention anyway with the words â€Å"For the first time in history†. I continue to read about devastation to humanity, and I immediately lose my appetite. Although an illustration takes up less than a tenth of the page, its powerful image draws me into the announcement. The featured collapsing â€Å"shelters† are real pictures mounted to an animated background of both urban and rural lands. These slums look rancid and polluted. I see shanties made of scrap metal and plastic. I see shacks made of old branches and mud. I am sure that certified building inspectors would never pass these â€Å"homes† with superior or even satisfactory ratings. Then I begin to doubt myself. Suddenly my breakfast doesn’t taste so appetizing. I am struck with guilt, so I feel a moral obligation to look into the efforts of Slam the Door on Poverty Housing! Curious about the issue, I research the housing project online. As I type away at my new laptop computer, mindlessly snacking and sipping bottled water, I can’t hold myself back from crying after seeing a horrific slideshow of people living in conditions unimaginable to me. The ... ...We will be judged by ‘I was hungry and you gave me to eat. I was naked and you clothed me. I was homeless and you took me in’†. It is my hope that many people take heart in this project. Like the advertisement in the newspaper exemplifies, the planet should not have masses of people living in such underdeveloped environments that they risk death to preventable diseases, have trouble finding ‘safe’ water and struggle to find a bite of food. Privileged families of the world are needed in conjunction with endorsers of the effort, like the United Nations, to effectively wipe out homelessness. With encouragement from the words of Millard Fuller, â€Å"many hearts and minds must go through a radical transformation. With God: all things truly are possible!† Works Cited World Habitat Day 2007. October 1, 2007. Slam the Door on Poverty Housing. http://www.slamthedoor.org