There are more than 3.5 million homeless people in the United States alone (National Student Campaign Against Hunger and Homelessness). Within this number of people, there are challenges beyond not having a home that the majority of citizens with a home do not face. These include: thinking about appearance, quality and source of food, living space and source of money. Those mentioned are just a few things that non-homeless people may overlook when thinking about the challenges of homelessness. As a nation, how we perceive others around us comes into play here. Intentionally or not, homeless people are often judged based on their circumstances rather than their identity. This may be due to the communication barrier between homeless and non-homeless people. In order to move away from judgments and stereotypes, education on the topic of homelessness is vital. The first time homelessness was recognized in the United States was as early as 1640. Homelessness was seen as a moral issue and character was questioned. One of the major religions of the time was the Christian faith. It was believed that a good Christian would be cared for by God and have all their needs met. If one did not act like a “good Christian,” then his needs would not be met. Therefore, because their needs were not met, the homeless were seen as bad people. (Downtown Congregations to End Homelessness) Robert Fischer, author of The History of Homelessness 1640 to the Present, noted, “Today, people experiencing homelessness have nothing to do with the intrinsic value of a person. Homelessness is a complex social problem with many variables. Unfortunately, for those who are homeless, the impact of the values ​​of the 1640s is still ever-present...... middle of paper ...... website. I thought he had an interesting idea and it was helpful for my article that he was able to teach his church the lesson of not being judgmental about appearance. “Overview of Homelessness in America.” National student campaign against hunger and homelessness. National Student Campaign Against Hunger and Homelessness, nd Web. March 15, 2014. The site gives numerous statistics on hunger in the United States. The website examines who is homeless and why. This source is credible because it is a national student campaign to end homelessness. It is also a .gov website. The website was helpful and gave me lots of statistics. In the end, I didn't use many of them, but they helped me understand who is homeless and the real number of homeless people in the United States. I used the statistic that there are approximately 3.5 million homeless people in the world..