Heard it Here

Sixteen men donned cap and gowns to celebrate their graduation from the Winston-Salem Rescue Mission during a ceremony October 3rd at the Center Grove Baptist Church in Clemmons.

Friends and families of the graduates filled the pews to hear musical performances from graduates and a keynote address from Pastor Deon Parker.

“This is the beginning of an amazing string of achievements in your life,” Parker told the group of men, who had just graduated from a 12-month recovery program.

The rescue mission, located between 7th and 8th on Trade Street, is a Christian non-profit organization that shelters homeless men struggling with drug and alcohol addiction. Patients are voluntarily checked in and stay at their own will.

The men enter into a 90-day program and may choose to extend their stay into one of two 12-month long programs. The largest of these programs resides at the New Life Center downtown and the other is on a 110-acre camp in Yadkin County.

“Everything we do here is rooted in the word of God and is for eternal change instead of temporary change,” said Program Director Greg Cooney, adding that the longer programs have a 60 percent completion rate.
The programs offer a wide variety of faith and professional classes with the idea that participants will become self-sufficient upon graduation.

The downtown location includes two buildings, one that has been in use since the 1970s and one that opened in 2008 and includes a kitchen, recreation room, fitness center, and computer lab for the residents to use.

Some of the men in the program are as young as 19 and others are midway into their 70s. One of the graduates, Jon Hutchinson, said he is a military veteran and is finishing up his second time through the rescue mission after struggling with depression and physical injury.

“I fought it tooth and nail but I ended up back in here, anyway,” Hutchinson said. “I was here in 2000, though there actually were no programs in 2000. Things weren’t as organized then as they are now.”

Hutchinson said he moved to Seattle after leaving the rescue mission the first time and worked until he injured his back. This physical disability left him unable to do his job and Hutchinson found himself homeless again and returned to Winston-Salem, he said.

Hutchinson said that the most effective treatment was an activity called “giants” where patients identify big problems in their life that have been holding them back. Hutchinson said that he struggled with pride, guilt, and forgiveness.

“I had a lot of guilty feelings about stuff in my past and wasn’t forgiving people who I perceived as wronging me,” he said. “Once I forgave them, I was finally able to forgive myself.”

While Cooney said that a main goal of the program is to provide its patients with opportunities after graduation, Hutchinson does not have a job or living arrangements lined up and will remain in the New Life Center for the time being. He is currently in the process of applying for social security disability and VASH, a program that helps homeless veterans receive public housing.

While receiving his diploma at the ceremony, Hutchinson was praised by Cooney for his intelligence and helpfulness to his classmates. Cooney told those in attendance that Hutchinson tutored other clients who had not graduated high school and helped them complete their GED.

Cooney said that Hutchinson is a unique case in that he came back to the rescue mission for a second time and that since 2008, the rescue mission has graduated 48 from its “Transformers” program, but only four have returned for more treatment.

According to Cooney, the organization receives its funding from private donations and profits from a thrift store on Cherry Street which is operated by the rescue mission. The store’s manager, Kathy Taylor, said that it makes around $50,000 in profit per month, which Cooney said accounts for about 25 percent of the rescue mission’s budget.

“It is very similar to the Goodwill” Cooney said. “One-hundred percent of the funds that come into the thrift store go right into the programs.”

Dr. Alan Cameron, the associate director of the Wake Forest University Counseling Center, praised the rescue mission’s work. Cameron said that while he didn’t always appreciate the role that religious faith could play in recovery, he has come to the belief that it is an important part curing addiction.

“People who are addicts have some kind of issue with control and have a spiritual void in their life,” Dr. Cameron said. “They need to realize that the world is bigger than themselves and some things are out of their control.”

Cameron said that while organizations like Alcoholics Anonymous try and establish a greater being, there are some experts who consider religious therapy ineffective. He also noted a large difference between the AA and the rescue mission is that the AA allows its patients to interpret God in whatever way they like, while the rescue mission exposes its men exclusively to Christian teachings.

Cooney embraced the role of Bible in their methods and said that the programs are based on the teachings of Christianity.

“We focus on the spiritual transformation and their identity in Christ as opposed to their identity in this world,” Cooney said. “We can just change them here and now, but we also want to change them throughout eternity by having a relationship with Christ.”

Hutchinson says that he had relapsed in his faith before coming into the rescue mission, but that his newly recovered Christianity helped him become a stronger man.

“We went over a lot of scripture about how to get through life without letting it get you down” Hutchinson said. “I would recommend this place to anybody. Anybody who is serious about making change in their life, this a good place to come. “