Safe house

Compassion | WORLD's East Region winner, the Bowery Women's Center, provides addicted women security, stability, and the love of Christ | Jill Lacey

James Allen Walker

NEW YORK CITY—The name "Bowery Mission" is most often associated with a men's program in lower Manhattan and its storied past. Founded in 1879, Bowery is the third-oldest rescue mission in the country. Eleanor Roosevelt sang in the chapel as a child, J.C. Penney found salvation there, Fanny Crosby penned hymns for the mission, and President William Howard Taft dropped by in 1909.

At the Bowery men's facility in lower Manhattan, institutional sounds and smells pervade. Metal chairs squeak on linoleum. Deep voices fill the space as men line up for the evening meal. Seemingly a world away, red doors provide an entrance into the Bowery Women's Center on the Upper East Side. Decorator fabrics and coordinated throw pillows accent tastefully arranged common rooms. French doors open onto a bucolic terraced patio area. Bedrooms have Pottery Barn décor rather than the military-style bunks of the men's shelter.