05011
January 6, 2005

Illinois homeless ministry to be featured on TV newsmagazine

Bloomington’s The Compassion Center on PBS

by Jerry L. Van Marter

LOUISVILLE — An innovative homeless ministry of Second Presbyterian Church in Bloomington, IL, will be featured on the PBS television newsmagazine show “Religion & Ethics Newsweekly” this week.

      The program, hosted by Bob Abernethy, is aired at different times during the weekend. Check your local PBS listings for air time in your area.

       When the Rev. Ted Pierce arrived in 2003 as pastor of Second Church, the city of Bloomington — a largely affluent community in central Illinois — was facing a growing homeless population. Though the congregation was primed to launch a capital campaign to erect a new building, Pierce suggested instead that a large unfinished basement be converted into a homeless shelter.

      Thus was born The Compassion Center, which opened last March after attracting considerable support from a broad-based community coalition of labor, government, church and local business groups.

      Serving as many as 60 homeless people each day, the center offers a wide variety of services, including assistance in finding permanent housing, GED classes and tutoring, and access to phones and computers.

      “Religion & Ethics Newsweekly” correspondent Judy Valente goes “behind the scenes” to see how The Compassion Center carries out its innovative ministry. As Pierce tells it in the segment: “They are you and me. They’ve fallen in the hole…. We’ve got to knock down those fences or we’re not going to solve these huge problems of poverty, oppression and discrimination in our communities.”