Where Do I Go?
Red Door E-Newsletter - September 2011
Declan came to a point in life when he knew his life hung in the balance … but he didn’t know how to change.
Declan is standing in Penn Station. He’s looking around – at the high ceilings, the TV monitors, the people moving around him – but he doesn’t see anything.
Declan is dead inside.
“I was in a black hole,” he explains, remembering the fog he was in just a few months ago. “I couldn’t get out. I stood there for three days trying to figure out what to do. I had lost my dignity.”
Declan had been doing drugs since he was 8 years old. He was already the man of the house with no rules to guide him. “My father was there in body, but I was the only one really ‘there,’” he says. “I joined a gang. I’ve been smoking and fighting ever since.”
But his mother didn’t give up hope. She always told Declan that he could get out of it – that she had faith in him.
Now standing in the middle of Penn Station, Declan remembers his mother’s words. He’s 29 years old and he knows his life hangs in the balance. But he doesn’t know where to go – and he doesn’t know how to change.
Suddenly a stranger interrupts his thoughts. “This guy started talking to me about God,” Declan remembers. “He told me about this program at The Bowery Mission.”
Declan heard what the man had to say and decided to give The Bowery Mission a try.
“I was afraid when I walked through those red doors,” he says. “I thought I was going to go crazy because I didn’t know how to trust people. Being in a gang – all they care about is how much money you can bring in or how many drugs you can sell."
“They don’t care if you’re dead or alive.”
But Declan found something different at The Bowery Mission. He found family.
“After that first month passed,” he says, “I noticed I hadn’t done anything stupid. And all of a sudden I had this circle of … friends.”
Declan pauses as he realizes what he’s saying.
“It’s like a real family. Not a gang family, not a street family – people waiting to rob me,” he says. “I have this beautiful family who’s trying to help me be a better man.”
Declan stayed in the program, did his best in the classes, learned to live with his new brothers. And best of all, he found a relationship with God.
“I’m back to being the son my mother always knew I was,” he says. “I’m giving back instead of taking away. People aren’t scared of me anymore – I have a God now who can help me.”
Declan smiles. He has a sense of winder in his eyes.
“My life is just beginning.”