Read the official Vatican text of the encyclical in English.

Temple Beth Am is a Reform congregation in Seattle that has been helping families avoid homelessness since 2004. The congregation’s Homeless 2 Remain helps families secure or maintain safe housing. In collaboration with Jewish Family Services, the congregation provides eviction prevention assistance aimed at keeping families in their homes. Contact is Sue Covey. The congregation […]

The Rev. Jana Drakka is a senior Zen Buddhist priest, calligrapher and community activist. She provides meditation, memorials and harm reduction groups for marginally housed people and those who work with them in San Francisco. She also advocates for the rights of those living in poverty.

The Mental Health Chaplaincy is a Seattle program based at Prospect Congregational United Church of Christ that has trained chaplains walking the city streets looking for vulnerable, mentally ill people who may need assistance. Contact Kae Eaton.

Karen Dudley is the founder and senior pastor of Dallas International Street Church, a nondenominational church of homeless people in Dallas.

Peter Laarman of Los Angeles is executive director of Progressive Christians Uniting and an ordained United Church of Christ minister. He is editor of the just-published Getting on Message: Challenging the Christian Right from the Heart of the Gospel (Beacon Press, 2006) and knows a lot of other groups active on this subject.

Greg Boyd is senior pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minn., and author of The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church, in which he says American Christians should seek to build the kingdom of God instead of building political power.

Jan G. Linn is author of Big Christianity: What’s Right with the Religious Left (Westminster John Knox, 2006) and a co-pastor of Spirit of Joy Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Minneapolis. A former college and seminary professor, Linn calls himself a “recovering fundamentalist” who wants to reclaim the idea of Christianity as generous, or liberal, and tolerant.

The Rev. Pamela D. Couture is the inaugural holder of the Jane and Geoffrey Martin Chair in Church and Community at Emmanuel College of Victoria University in the University of Toronto. She is the author of Child Poverty: Love, Justice and Social Responsibility and Seeing Children, Seeing God: A Practical Theology of Children and Poverty.