Boston Archbishop Cardinal Seán O'Malley spent Christmas Eve helping to serve over 1,000 people at the Pine Street Inn's annual luncheon as the homeless shelter works to keep its population safe while the omicron variant spreads around the region.
"At Bethlehem, there was no room in the inn. At Pine Street Inn, there's always room for our brothers and sisters," O'Malley said before joining the Pine Street Inn staff to distribute gifts and serve meals.
O'Malley blessed shelter residents before joining staff inside to serve a lunch menu of lasagna, garlic bread, salad and various pies.
Pine Street President Lyndia Downie said the holidays can be hard for people experiencing homelessness, especially during the second year of the pandemic.
"If you're here for Christmas, you probably don't have another option to go somewhere," Downie told GBH News.
"Often part of what's complicated when people end up here is that those bridges they may have had to family or friends or some kind of social support have been torn down for a whole variety of reasons," she added.
Downie said the Inn has kept the positive rate of its residents to under 1% with routine pool testing, added precautions and expanded hours. In addition to meals at the main Pine Street Inn facility in the South End, Downie said over 800 residents in non-shelter housing across Boston and Brookline will also enjoy holiday services.
Residents of the South End shelter say they're grateful for the holiday outreach as they wait for more permanent housing placements.
"It's the process more than anything else. There's one day at a time. We just have to continue to say — how do you say it? — 'Grind it out,' and then hopefully in time we can find out what's available to us. One day at a time," said Rufus Perryman, 56, a two-and-a-half year resident of the inn.
