Why are Rick Steves and these folks smiling? Because those folks have shelter thanks to the Christlike compassion of globe trotter Rick Steves.
I’m placing this story about Rick Steves–a man whom I as a veteran traveler has always admired–in my “Stories That Make you Go Wow!’ in a Good Way!” file.
The legendary TV travel guide has given a $4 million apartment complex to homeless women and kids who needed housing.
Writes Steves:
Before “Europe Through the Back Door,” my travels were “Europe Through the Gutter.” Slumming through Europe as a teenage backpacker, life for me was the daily challenge of finding an affordable (i.e., free) place to sleep. […]
I traveled in Central America, where I learned civil wars that I thought were between communists and capitalists were actually between obscenely rich oligarchs and landless peasants. I hung out with poor Christians who took the Biblical Jubilee Year (the notion that every fifty years the land is to be re-divided and debts are to be forgiven) seriously… even though rich Christians assumed God must have been kidding. [My italics for emphasis: Steves gets extra points from me for the God-talk.}
Back home, one of my pet social causes has long been affordable housing.
And so …
I urge you to read the whole story here, or at least watch the video.
It’s a good kind of “Wow!” story at a time when there are so many
“Wow!” stories of the other kind in the news.
Dear Paul, I had no idea Rick Steves (whom I, too, enjoy watching) was so committed a Christian. If only more individuals – especially the wealthy and the uber-rich (obscenely rich) – were willing to do with a little less, so all might enjoy a little more, Jesus might smile more! Especially in this era of the “Trump!”