By Mike Finney

CLAYTON — Homelessness is a broad-reaching issue that stretches across the entire United States.

Six months living as a homeless person gave Paul Mast, an ordained Catholic priest, a unique perspective of how their population gets by on a day-to-day basis and the relationships they forge with one another.

Mr. Mast lived amongst homeless people in eight different cites from August 2013 to March 2014.

That served as the impetus for Mr. Mast writing a book about his experiences called “Street Sabbatical — Life Lessons for a Contemplative Beggar.”

After looking back at the stories and experiences that Mr. Mast became a part of for half a year, he decided to turn some of those memories into songs for a show that he will debut in Delaware in April — “Compassion Street — The Musical.”

“This was already in the imagination pipeline,” Mr. Mast said, who is also producer of the musical. “So, the book came first. Then I put it aside for a while, and I wrote a novel, and then, COVID happened … and I revisited this, and as I was rereading it, the musical started.

“COVID was an awakening experience. I started climbing walls and then my fingernails started hurting. So then, I thought, ‘Well, this isn’t kosher,’ and that’s when I revisited the book.”

During his quarantine, the words became lyrics and the lyrics became a musical.

Seventeen songs, with PowerPoint presentation, props, six singers, a storyteller and four musicians bring the two-hour story to life.

Four “premieres” of “Compassion Street: The Musical” are scheduled for April to showcase the message of how homelessness affects those physically displaced living on streets and those emotionally displaced living in houses.

“I sought these (musicians) out and one person led to another, led to another,” Mr. Mast said. “There will be one homeless person at the opening of the second act who will come out and give a little witness talk about homelessness and trying to put it back together and talking about how the shelters have helped them do that.”

The first showing will take place April 11 at the Smyrna High School Theater at 7:30 p.m. The musical will then hit the stage on April 12 at The Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts in Dover at 7:30 p.m.

The goal of the show is to help change the “inner view” of audiences about these two aspects of homelessness.

Mr. Mast sent his lyrics to Los Angeles composer Seth Bowser who helped turn them into song.

They combine to tell the story of a homelessness population that shot up by more than 12% in 2023, reaching more than 600,000 people, according to the U.S. Department of Urban Planning and Development.

The federal government calculates the number each year based on counts from local officials on a single night in January known as a “Point in Time” count.

“I got introduced to Paul because several years ago I was working in Tampa with a music director at a Catholic church and Paul had gotten in touch with the music director looking for a composer and my former boss said, ‘I’m not able to work on it right now, but I know a guy,’” Mr. Bowser said. “I’d recently worked on another musical out in L.A. about pirates.

“So, Paul and I got together, and we talked about the project and it’s one that I’m really looking forward to see come into fruition. I think if anybody can write about this, Paul’s a great candidate to do that. He’s had those experiences.”

Mr. Mast experienced firsthand the plight of an oft-ignored population during his street sabbatical.

“It was an unstructured sabbatical, where I learned life lessons I would not have learned in classrooms,” said Mr. Mast, a resident of Clayton and a native of Dover. “For 42 years, as a priest, my life was structured and defined by calendars. But I did something radically different for this experience.

“I desired a change of rhythm and landscape for my interior life. So, I became a pilgrim with the homeless, downsizing my life and acquiring their rhythm of walking, begging and seeking shelter.”

His journey led him to interactions with homeless people in eight cities — including Dallas, Honolulu, Milwaukee and San Francisco — and four cultures, traveling overseas to Munich and New Delhi.

Now, it is a lineup of six singers who will help sing about his experiences.

“A friend of mine in church had spoken to Paul Mast about just how he was doing, and what he was doing, and he mentioned he needed a soprano because he had lost one that he thought was going to work out,” said Denise Russell, of Galena, Maryland, after the group had their first rehearsal together March 16 at Asbury United Methodist Church in Smyrna.

All of the rehearsals we had done had been independent, recordings and sheet music.”

Ms. Russell is excited to see how the audience reacts to the stories of the homeless when the curtain opens for the first time in Smyrna

“I think it shows such a compelling story and the music is so well-written,” she said. “Now that I’m hearing the singers and everything come to life a little bit, it’s really remarkable.”

For tickets and details of other shows, visit CompassionStreetTheMusical.com.

Staff writer Mike Finney can be reached at 302-741-8230 or mfinney@iniusa.org.
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