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 Shane always had a view that the world was bigger than the small southern town in which he was raised. The catalyst for his community came in 1995 when a group of poor and homeless families were living in an abandoned church cathedral. Facing eviction from the church, Shane and 100 young people got involved with helping the families by fighting their eviction.
They helped the families with basic needs and starting sharing "church" with them. The experience ignited a fire within him and he wondered what it could mean to live in community like the early church. He decided to stop complaining about the church and start doing something to make a difference by living along side the poor and helping them. Shane's faith was shaped as a young man growing up in East Tennessee and grew further at Eastern where he studied under Tony Campolo and Duffy Robbins.
Now his zany zest for service includes throwing out money to street people and providing exquisite meals like lobster to them. Shane says, "Our generation in particular is keenly aware that the world we've been handled is very fragile. Maybe God had another dream for the world than the American dream. We have pulled ourselves away from community so much that it might seem that what the Simple Way is doing is radical but really what we are doing feels very natural". Shane believes that the small things make a big difference. The people of Northern Philadelphia touched by Shane and the Simple Way would probably agree.
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