This morning I’m on my way home from a 24 hour visit to Montreal. I went there to hang out with a very good and longstanding friend of mine who has been slugging it out on the streets of Montreal for more than a decade. He and his other friends in Montreal that are doing the same kind of work are building a coalition of faith-based street workers with the hopes of networking with, learning from, training and encouraging other like-minded people in the province of Quebec.
They invited me in to their meeting last night due to my new found role (in my spare time) as chairperson of Street Level; a national roundtable on poverty and homelessness, under the umbrella of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada (EFC). We are a coalition of 14 leaders of agencies scattered all throughout Canada that exists to advocate to the church, to business, and to government that it is absolutely vital and necessary to place care of people who are poor and vulnerable at the center of the activities of each of these entities. (Yes, this is an admittedly lofty and perhaps even naive goal but one that we each passionately believe is fundamental to ensuring equality for all people.) Some of my heroes, mentors and teachers are members of this group and I was overwhelmed with the honour of being recently invited by each member to be the next chair of the coalition.
To find out more about us and to learn who is a part of it, check out our website at
www.streetlevel.ca. There you will find our foundational document that guides all of what we do called The Ottawa Manifesto. It is a truly awesome piece that will direct us into our future endeavours.
The centerpiece of our work has been a national conference held every three years in Ottawa. Here almost 500 like-minded people gathered in March of this year to be together, to advocate to government, and to challenge each other to be committed to justice in this country. It was a truly amazing conference and plans are already in the works for March of 2012. But our newest goal is to have 2 regional conferences each year in different cities across Canada. These will explore more local justice related issues as well as hopefully draw together people in smaller regions who may not already know each other well. The folks in Montreal have taken the ball and are running with it and I am thankfully in a position now to offer the round table’s support and resources. We are hoping that by October of next year there will be a regional gathering/conference of French speaking evangelical street workers in Montreal; the first one ever of its kind. We really do believe that we can do more together than we can do on our own, and Montreal wants in on that. One of our most important partners is World Vision and they are providing some much needed funding in order to get this off the ground.
I’m writing this so that more people can know about it. It has huge potential to make change in this country. The church in Canada finally gets that it needs to take issues of poverty and justice seriously and are now asking ‘How do we do it?” We want to be able to lend our expertise and support to those churches wanting to take a stand.
Some may fear that this is just another way to abuse people on the streets by proselytizing them. I absolutely understand why many people might think that as the church, historically has quite frankly at times done just that. But my friend Amy Fisher puts it far better than I can;
“Evangelical Christianity in the public sphere is usually typified by conservative, fundamentalist congregations which claim to uphold family values, and are politically engaged in issues like abortion and homosexuality. At the same time, Evangelical Social Services are more likely to be criticized for offering food, shelter and other necessities without engaging in acts of advocacy or justice to end cycles of poverty and need. Scholars in many cases seem content to accept Evangelicalism characterized in this way, but other evangelical groups have always existed alongside this prominent type. More socially-engaged, progressive and left-leaning by orientation, these other evangelicals are growing in number as many, particularly young adults, some raised in evangelical homes, others who have converted later, are renegotiating what it means to be an Evangelical”
We’d like to count ourselves as part of this new kind of evangelical as we move towards a more just society. I am hopeful for what can come of it.
I’ll be back one more time tomorrow to finish my fall thoughts.
Shalom,
Dion