Churches give families bridge to a home

ROCK HILL — After a couple of weeks staying at a hotel, Jennifer Malzahn's finances were so grim she wasn't sure she had the money to pay for her daughter's lunch at school, much less the next week's rent.

The 42-year-old single mother of two was broke and unemployed. She couldn't find a job, didn't have a place to live, couldn't afford gas and quickly was reaching the end of her rope.

But Malzahn found help at the Interfaith Hospitality Network of York County, a nonprofit organization that provides food and shelter to homeless families with children through a network of churches.

After just a few months of help, Malzahn and her daughters, Myla, 5, and Mallory, 4, were able to move into their own town house. They have donated furniture, linens, dishes, clothes and decorations — all the things that make the place feel like home.

Malzahn said she doesn't know where she would be were it not for the help of Interfaith volunteers.

Malzahn and her girls are one of many families that have been temporarily sheltered by the Interfaith Hospitality Network.

The network accepts men and women with children. Families stay in empty Sunday school classrooms during the week. On Sundays, they move to the next of the network's 14 churches. Dinner is provided at the churches and there are lockers and showers at the network's office.

But Interfaith Hospitality is not just a shelter, it's a program to help people find permanent homes.

"We don't want people to recycle and come back or go to another shelter," said Jennifer Coye, executive director of the local network. "We want people to be self-sufficient."

In the past three years, the York County network served 32 families with 55 children. The average stay lasts three to six months.

"Typically, they're just your average people that you would see in the grocery store, sitting next to you in church, just one paycheck away from disaster," Coye said.