Update on my work

I recently attended a conference for “Truthtellers and Peacemakers” put on by the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada’s National Roundtable on Poverty and Homelessness. Many there were impressed by Street Level’s clarion call for evangelicals who walk alongside poor folks “to add to material action a clear, creative, and challenging public voice,” a public voice insisting “that homelessness will be a priority” for Canadian “policy makers concerned with justice and mercy.” Almost everyone there signed their names to the Roundtable’s Ottawa Manifesto (http://www.streetlevel.ca/manifesto/) which was published in last Monday’s Ottawa Citizen. As an American leery of nationalism, I was nevertheless blessed simply to be present with three hundred and fifty delegates, 75% of whom occupy their time as front line workers with those who are street involved. Steve Bell sang. Ten year old Hannah Talyor of the Ladybug Foundation delighted the crowd by speaking in one of the plenary sessions, and Sister Sue Mosteller and Bill van Buren of L’Arche Daybreak daily focused our attention on a spirituality of brokenness through stories, joke telling, and reflections upon art and Scripture. In two of our other plenary sessions, Sanctuary’s Greg Paul called our attention to the potency we have been gifted with in the stories of those we encounter, while Rick Tobias of Yonge Street Mission spoke prophetically of the absolute necessity for those who would fight poverty to stand against violence, especially violence against women and children. My imagination was fired by a workshop on mobilizing volunteers and Ray Aldred’s session on First Nations reiterated just how important an intergenerational atmosphere is both for those who find themselves socially isolated and for the wider church. Of the plethora of poignant stories shared at the conference, perhaps most poignant for me was the story of Bill van Buren. Bill, who has an intellectual disability and a high-pitched, contagious laugh, was the first core member of L’Arche and traveled and spoke for years with Henri Nouwen. Over a long period of time, Nouwen and others urged Bill to make a life book, a collection of letters, pictures, and other scraps from his life. After constant refusal, Bill finally agreed with the caveat that nothing from his first sixteen years of life be included. You see, before Bill arrived at L’Arche, he was homeless. Decades later, Bill is one of the fortunate ones. Rather than revolving his way through asylums, group homes, boarding rooms, and further stints on the street like so many others similarly situated, Bill has found supportive housing in the context of a permanent Christian community for the entirety of his adult life. An inspiration for Lazarus Rising indeed.