So in my church, after every service, different people are responsible each week for serving food to the congregation in the parish hall, and today my family was serving food. Most people had received food and left, and this homeless man, who comes to the parish hall sometimes, approached us when most of the food was already gone, except for a small portion of pasta that had already been wrapped up. He asked for more pasta, and my sister, for some weird reason, was hesitant to give him the food (she’s extremely socially awkward; I’m assuming because the food was wrapped up she was hesitant to re-open it). The homeless man sensed this and then said abrasively, “If you want to keep it for yourself at home, you can! You don’t have to give it to me!”, and he walked away.
He came back a minute later, got in my sister’s face, and kept being pushy and abrasive saying “Well the thing is is that I’m homeless! Are you taking that home with you?! I don’t think you need it!” and he was very rude in his approach. If he had calmly, nicely asked for food, I would have gladly given him food without a problem, but with my sister constantly not standing up for herself in many social situations, I just lost my temper and I yelled at him in front of everyone, because he continuously kept demanding food by saying that we don’t need food because we have a home to go to. I said, “Yes if you want the food we will give it to you! Sit down! Just sit down! You don’t have to be rude!”. Side note: I also overheard him tell our family friend that if we were in the streets, it would have been a “different scenario” (meaning he would fight me. Luckily he didn’t get a good look at my face lol). I walked into the kitchen, where my other sister and my mother were working (they only saw me yelling. They didn’t know why). They found out why, and at first I thought they would be on my side, but then they all looked at me with disappointment and shock at my behavior, with all of them basically saying that I should not have yelled at him because we were in a church, and he MIGHT be mentally ill.They say I should have just kept my composure and given him the food, but I slightly disagree for two reasons. 1. Throughout my life, there have been many occasions where my mother has YELLED at disrespectful people in places like our school, our church, over the phone, etc., so I think she’s a complete hypocrite. Also, throughout my life my mother has been giving me conflicting messages. One minute she tells me that if someone is rude to let it go, kill rude people with kindness, and basically be a pushover. Then the next occasion that someone was rude to me and I said nothing, she scolded me for being a pushover, told me stand up for myself, and stop letting people be rude to me. To be completely honest, I truly believe my mom only cares that I yelled at someone because it will affect HER image, not mine.
- The second reason I disagree with her is because we don't know FOR SURE if the man is mentally ill. I don't think he is at all, but just because he is homeless, my sisters and mothers assumed he is mentally ill, and therefore I should have just been quiet and let him be rude. However, is mental illness an excuse to be rude? I'd like some of your opinions on that.
I’m sick of people thinking they can talk to me or my sister like that, because we are extremely nice people and they can walk all over us. To be completely honest, I don’t feel bad at all for what I did, but should I? What would you guys have done? Is my mom a hypocrite? Thanks for reading. 
