Outside the Gates of University City

I love the location of my apartment—situated between some of the poorest neighborhoods in Philly and “University City,” where some of the wealthiest, most privileged students in the country live, learn, and play. The contrast between them can be staggering sometimes: the rich and the poor, the privileged and the oppressed, the white and those of color, the clean and the dirty, those gorging and those starving—so close in proximity, yet so distant from one another.

I have positioned myself to be able to engage in both of those spaces. In my work and church, I am often serving, learning, and worshipping with Philadelphia’s poor. But I am also volunteering with the chapter of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania, so I have a foothold in that world, too.

At this point, I’m pretty comfortable in both. I’m used to being me in both of those spaces, and they each offer me a lot, but the two don’t always know what to do with each other. It’s the tension between them that I often find myself navigating.

Like this conversation I heard on my way home from the Penn IV Bible study last Thursday between a group of students I didn’t know:

--You see a lot of people like that on the streets.

--Yeah have you seen the guy down near our apartment? The one that’s always just sitting?

--Yeah! He sits there all day—the one with the red shirt. His eyes are yellow as the sun!

--I mean when I see him, I get worried if he’s going to die in like the next 3 months or something. It’s sad.

--Well he does it to himself. At seven in the morning, with one bottle already down—that’s how you’re gonna spend your day? Where do you go from there?

--I really wonder how much longer he’s gonna live, though. It’s depressing to think about, but it can’t be much longer…

--Nah, those people don’t die. You can’t get rid of em.

This conversation is in itself interesting, one bro-ish student intrigued by and genuinely concerned for a man he sees dying, or at least only minimally alive, the other student wondering why the man can’t pull himself together and make something more of himself. Neither of them is really doing anything about the guy they apparently see all the time.

What makes the conversation more interesting is what we discussed at Bible study right before I overheard it: the story of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16: 19-31), which illustrates exactly the situation of the these students and the red-shirted, sitting man.

Like the rich man in the story, the students probably have way more than they need to survive; they’ll likely have incredibly successful careers and live comfortably, rarely in need. And like Lazarus, the red-shirted man sits right outside their apartment, a social outcast in desperate need. Finally, like Jesus’ story, the college kids know all about the guy who sits there and even suspect he may die soon, yet they do nothing for him.

Wow. Who knew the story could get so real?

I’ve learned over the last few years to love like Jesus loved, to love the poor, who, if they’re like Lazarus, go to heaven just because they live lives of anguish. That’s why I live, work, and attend church in the ‘hood, to have as many opportunities as possible to share Jesus’ love for the poor.

But God is also teaching me to love the rich guys, the college students with access, opportunity, resources, and privilege. The rich man in the story ends up in hell, begging for a touch of water on his tongue to relieve his agony, and although it’s hard to love him based on how he treated Lazarus, it’s also difficult to read about his eternity. Likewise, it was hard for me to love those guys as they talked about the man with the red shirt. It hurt me to hear so little regard for his life. But I don’t like to consider the idea of them sharing the same fate as the rich man in Jesus’ story.

University City is just as much a part of Philadelphia as Mantua, Powelton, or Southwest Philly. Loving this city means loving all of its people and positioning myself between the different worlds within it to pursue reconciliation.

While the conversation I overheard was disheartening, the ones I shared at Bible study were encouraging, with students asking questions like, “Who are the ones sitting outside our gates?” and making plans to bridge those divides by showing love to a neighbor who spends much of his time on the street. At rare moments in this city I get to see people reach across those divides. It’s those moments I love most about where I live.