New housing facility in the name of Pope Francis opens in Philadelphia

A new housing opportunity opens Wednesday in Philadelphia for those who need some help. It’s named after the pope who came to town with a reminder to remember those in need.

The 94-unit Francis House of Peace on Arch Street was developed with Project HOME and the Middleton Partnership in cooperation with the Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corporation. The supportive housing is just another step toward ending homelessness in Philadelphia, said Sister Mary Scullion of Project HOME.

“We’ll have a combination of low-income senior citizens from Chinatown who can hardly afford to live in Chinatown these days, as well as homeless youth, youth who are LGBTQ and chronically homeless people who once lived on the streets,” Scullion said.

The facility will also be the home of the framework from the Knotted Grotto, an installation that was visited by Pope Francis during his time in Philadelphia.

Thousands of visitors to the grotto wrote their prayers on strips of cloth that were tied to the framework. Those knots of hope will be used in the next development by Project HOME in North Philadelphia.

Editor’s note: This story has been corrected; an earlier version misidentified the Middleton Partnership.