Greg Boyle’s 2010 bestselling book, Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion, has been an inspiration to our work at the Institute for Social Concerns. In the book, Boyle writes, “our common human hospitality longs to find room for those who are left out.” For Boyle, this hospitality looks like radical kinship, based on unconditional love, in which people are welcomed into relationship, needs are met as they arise, and the circle of compassion grows as voices on the margins are heard and embraced. At Homeboy Industries, the largest gang-intervention, rehabilitation, and re-entry program in the world, what some might call entrepreneurship is less about programming and more about responsiveness driven by love—which has resulted in schools, job creation, mental health counseling, tattoo removal, and countless other interventions. At the heart of all these interventions is a community grounded in radical love and belonging. Father G is known for telling stories, and his life is, indeed, a storied existence—not a strategic plan, but an embodied response to believing the ultimate reality is one of love, and that we flourish when our lives and relationships reflect the abundance of that love to others.

We sat down with Fr. Boyle to discuss his work over almost 4 decades, and how his generous vision of human goodness and dignity continues to have implications for social change. Read More