Nine new friends took a journey from Dallas, TX to Nashville, TN to spend the morning with the Thistle Farms community and learn about the program, the message and the method. Among these guests were a judge, a county commissioner, a vice squad lieutenant, a police sergeant and the director of a women's treatment facility. They were all here because they are looking to start a similar program in Dallas.Elisabeth Holland, a nurse practitioner and Director of Project Matthew, had been looking for a way to create stability and establish community for women who had been on the streets and eventually in jail. She found that most women she worked with had no other ways of surviving.
After talking with friends in her own community, Bob Mason, a missionary in Dallas, put her in touch with a friend who is friends with Becca Stevens. Good news for Lis -- she didn't have to create this kind of community from scratch, it already existed!
Lis gathered people working on a project called New Life Opportunities (or Prostitution Diversion Initiative) and set up a visit to Nashville where they could hear and see how the Magdalene program operates and runs. We look forward to helping this organization out by sharing our own experiences and as one of the women in the circle said this morning, "let the women in Dallas know they have sisters in Nashville that are here for them."
story & photos by Carolyn Snell
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