San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg confers with Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller after religious community leaders and Interfaith San Antonio Alliance members signed a proclamation at Haven for Hope Chapel to improve the availability of affordable housing for the city's homeless.

Community religious leaders and the Interfaith San Antonio Alliance are joining together to call for improving the availability of affordable housing for the city's homeless.

More than 50 religious community leaders and Haven for Hope staff gathered Friday at Haven’s Chapel of Hope, designated as a place of prayer for everyone.

“We are united in our belief that all human beings are children of God and entitled to lives of dignity,” said the Rev. Mignon Jones-Spann, associate minister of Antioch Missionary Baptist Church.

The clergy signed their names to a poster-sized document affirming that adequate housing is a basic human right and that homelessness and affordable housing remain a severe, widespread community blight in San Antonio.

Mayor Ron Nirenberg talked about the city’s initiatives and said work is underway with the faith community to identify almost 3,000 of acres of underdeveloped property to focus on affordable housing projects.

Rabbi Samuel M. Stahl, who helped found the alliance, said the gathering is something the city has not seen since the 1960s when Catholics, Protestants and Jews joined to end segregation in San Antonio.

The rabbi emeritus of Temple Beth-El said that now the initiative includes evangelical, Muslim and Sikh faiths working together to complete “God’s unfinished business in San Antonio.”

According to the group, 19 percent of San Antonio residents live at or below the poverty line. The initiative announced Friday grew from a New York University study called the Religious Leadership and Civic Engagement Project.

San Antonio joined Indianapolis, Minneapolis and Miami as one of four cities where faith leaders have come together to address an issue of concern in their communities. The interfaith coalition of San Antonio chose affordable housing as its social justice initiative.

Several faith leaders and Nirenberg sat in a row of chairs next to the poster-size proclamation, each stepping to the lectern to speak in solidarity.

Max Lucado, Christian author and preaching minister of Oak Hills Church, gave the opening prayer.

“What You have done for us, would You allow us to do for others,” he said. “As You have been our spiritual shelter, would You use us to provide physical shelter. Bless Your children with a roof to protect them, a foundation to support them, walls and windows for safety and light. ”

Imam Omar Shakir of Masjid Bilal Ibn Rabah of San Antonio said the faith community has always made strides to help the underprivileged.

“Let us leave our comfortable houses of worship and let us get out into society and make a difference among the people,” he said. “I follow Mohammad the prophet, and he taught us that if you go to bed knowing that your neighbor has not eaten and is hungry, you’re not really a believer. He didn’t say your Muslim neighbor, he just said your neighbor.”

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