Writing the review of this book at the height of the pandemic is quite odd, for most of the all too many homeless men and women on the streets of Oxford have all been found accommodation. This perhaps testifies to the way in which local authorities may well be able to end swiftly the problem of homelessness, but I am fairly convinced that once the crisis is over, men and women will return to the street. Part of this, of course, is because of the complexity of the nature of homelessness, which is not solved by simply putting a roof over someone's head, as necessary as that is as a first step. There are countless questions of mental health, poverty, and inequality of opportunity that all contribute to making the problem of homelessness an intractable problem. The editors of this book have done a good job at bringing together many different experiences of those who work with the homeless and showing how it is complicated by our globalised society, where homelessness often goes hand-in-hand with migration, economic exploitation, and statelessness, as well as those we are more familiar with addiction and mental health issues. I am not sure that I am as optimistic about the likelihood of solving the problem homelessness as some of the contributors to this volume.
But while this volume testifies to a broad range of experience, and beautiful and important work done with those who find themselves homeless, there are real problems with this collection of essays. As a collection of sociological evidence, it could indeed prove useful, but as a theological enquiry it is marked by a number of deficiencies. Throughout the work there are more citations to the UN Sustainable Development Goals than there are references to the Sacred Scriptures, only one essay, that of the editor James F. Keenan SJ, offers a sustained engagement with the Scriptures. Moreover, only one article, that of Kelly S. Johnson on the history of the Catholic Worker Movement, cites any papal document before John Paul II. The problem seems clear: a depth of experience is not met in a depth of theological reflection which takes into account the wider tradition of the social doctrine of the Church, or a sustained reflection on the Scriptures. A key question for the editors of this book is how they could bring the experiences of those in poverty and homelessness today into a sustained reflection on the Scriptures - be it the words of the Lord on the poor in the gospels, or the words of the Law in Deuteronomy. Because there is not this sustained reflection on a broader tradition, there is no reflection on how the homeless can be better integrated into the life of parishes, particularly in how parishes can answer spiritual needs as well as physical needs of warmth, food, and clothing. Here contributions on the role of pastors, as well as consecrated religious and the lay faithful, in spiritual accompaniment of those suffering from addiction or mental health problems would be appropriate, perhaps reflecting more deeply on questions in moral theology around the nature of addiction.
Part of the problem here is the lack of precision with terms used within the social doctrine of the Church, which Russell Hittinger pointed out so clearly in his 2020 Aquinas Lecture here in Oxford. Catholic social teaching, particularly as it instantiated in the 2004 Compendium, rests on a series of principles and values which have not undergone sustained reflection. This volume is certainly a testament to the ongoing work of the Church in caring for the poorest and most disadvantaged, but it requires significantly more theological reflection to count as an investigation of Catholic theological ethics.
