Tricycle | Awake in the World

The intersection of Thirty-first Street and Park Avenue in Manhattan seems an unlikely place to find spiritual refuge. And yet here in the shadow of the Empire State Building, tucked amid towering office buildings on a bustling midtown morning, stands a curious pair: the New York branch of Jews for Jesus, and a few doors down, the Tibet Center. On signage alone, the evangelicals appear to be winning the battle for business, with large lettering plastered across the building’s facade. They’ve got a nice big wooden plaque, etched in boldface. Tibet Center, on the fifth floor of an unremarkable redbrick building, has a quieter presence; but for the small metal sign hanging above its front door, you wouldn’t know it was there at all.