Neille Ilel, writing on Reason Online, examines the work of nontraditional, de-centralized relief organizations in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Both the government and the Red Cross have struggled and failed to meet the needs of the victims in and around New Orleans. Ilel admits that these private groups have not necessarily scored a victory, but they have, generally, been more effective in helping the victims recover because they can quickly adapt their methods.

There is a rich tradition of Christian Anarchism which emphasizes such action. Most notable is the Catholic Worker Movement, initiated by Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin, which emphasized decentralized economics and politics and personal action. Additionally, Ivan Illich decried the loss of such unsanctioned action in his Tools for Conviviality, specifically the type of "street medic" Ilel describes in New Orleans:

Common Ground’s initial incarnation was a medical clinic in an Algiers mosque. Algiers is a decidedly poor and drab cousin to the rest of New Orleans; it’s hard to believe that its sprawl of nondescript homes and apartment buildings is just across the Mississippi River from the French Quarter. But unlike the city across the river, Algiers didn’t flood. And within a few days of the storm, several young men on bicycles started knocking on doors in this unremarkable place, asking if people needed medical help. They called themselves street medics.

“A street medic,” explains Iggy River, a Common Ground volunteer, “is a person with an indeterminate amount of knowledge, usually from mass gatherings or street protests, of acute need first aid”—treatment for dehydration, cuts, broken bones. With his dark disheveled hair and giant wooden ear spools, Iggy looked like he would be more at home at a World Trade Organization protest than coordinating supplies in the ruins of a poor black neighborhood. Indeed, it was for such protests that the street medics learned their craft. After Katrina, street medics provided first aid and basic medical services such as blood pressure and diabetes testing.

While I am sympathetic to aspects of Christian political action (most notably those of the Neocalvinists), I firmly believe that we must begin at the grassroots level, doing the dirty work ourselves. Too often, when we believe that the State has some obligation to care for the downtrodden (for which, of course, there is Scriptural precedent), we too easily abdicate our responsibility (handed down to us from Christ Himself), and soon we believe that simply supporting policy positions is enough.