Sharing Our Justice Journey In Community

The Journey

It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon when a lively group of Ottawans rambled down the highway to Hamilton. There were two priests, two young adults from a local parish and the two of us. We were among the 85 or so clergy and lay people from across the country making our way to “Community Justice Camp – Live the Change you want to see.”

Even though some of us were meeting for the first time, it wasn’t long before we began sharing stories. Stories about our families and our travels, as well as some of the mundane details of our lives. With many hours between home and our destination, we also had time to talk about the “intention” of Justice Camp broadly speaking, our hopes and expectations for the week ahead, and what had compelled us to participate in this intensive social justice event in the first place. We were building our own little community.

Karri emphasizes interplay of charity, justice, and community

In my opening remarks on Monday morning, I reflected on the central role of community – geographic, experience-based, or otherwise – in our pursuit of social justice. And, I expressed my gratitude at having the opportunity to be among the faithful group that had gathered at Community Justice Camp to learn, share, and grow together as we explored how to discern and interpret local needs in a way that leads to charity, justice, and a strong and healthy community for all.

Community Justice Camp, hosted by the Diocese of Niagara, was the fifth such event sponsored by the Anglican Church of Canada. Themes of past camps were food security (2005), advocacy (2006), the environment (2007), and poverty (2009). In each case a central piece of the week was the three-day immersion experience. This year, eight immersion groups were formed, each set to explore a particular dimension of community, namely poverty, housing, environmental justice, welcoming the stranger, building neighbourhoods, empowering communities and coalition building, food security and Aboriginal justice. Karri was in the housing group, while Rebekah spent the week with the environmental justice group.

Rebekah and environmental justice

Personally, I have always viewed environmental justice separately from other issues, seeing it as concerning mainly our relationship with creation and not necessarily with other people. However, as we visited more and more environmental organizations, my view changed completely.

A common theme emerged, revealing the connection between environmentalism, over-consumption, economic growth, and need to promote the well-being of people. The priority of governments, companies and individuals is often to produce as much as possible while spending as little as possible, instead of building community, or even protecting the well-being of others.

This was evident in talking to local groups concerning Hamilton’s many factories, and national organizations looking at issues, like the tar sands. It stretches beyond the impact on the physical environment – the air, the water and the land –to the people that live in these areas, drink the water and breathe the air.

Many of us felt trapped by the systems that govern our society, seeing no way out of the preoccupation with consumption, growth and profits. However, hope comes with the building of communities and a society where the well-being of all people is valued.

Our journey was likened to the story of Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt, into the wilderness and eventually to the Promised Land. It was hard to leave Egypt, where there was some sense of security, to wander in the wilderness for decades, before reaching the Promised Land. But crossing the Jordan made the 40 years worth it.

Karri gets ground-level view of the challenges of affordable housing

Traveling alongside individuals with a wide range of experiences and personal histories, I had the opportunity to explore the front-line reality of Canada’s affordable housing crisis. We visited an emergency shelter in Oakville, a housing cooperative in Kitchener, a dilapidated public housing complex in Toronto, and housing advocacy networks in Burlington and Hamilton. Despite the range of perspectives, there was a constant refrain: the government is not doing enough to respond to the desperate need for safe, adequate and affordable housing in our community.

We met with a priest whose parish has recently come to a courageous conclusion about how best to move forward as a declining congregation, while at the same time putting their faith in action. They will soon be tearing down the old church and replacing it with a new mixed-income condominium building, that will, of course, include space for a new community church. We also wandered through the infamous Regent Park in Toronto where the first phase of redevelopment is currently approaching completion. The particular beauty of this construction is not only that it too will provide mixed-income housing, but it is indistinguishable from the stunning structures on the adjoining blocks.

At the end of each day, I wasn’t sure whether I should be devastated or encouraged. So many innovative initiatives were underway… but there were still so many roadblocks. As a group, we reflected on our work, be it in emergency shelter, public education or policy. In the end, we concluded that everyone has the right to a home. And until we get there, we’re glad to know that each of us is doing what we can to address this challenge.

Bringing it back home

At the end of the week we reconvened as a large group to share what we had learned, pray, sing, and worship together. We were also invited to consider how we might take our experiences back to our home communities. Despite the vast collective knowledge and experience in the room, it was clear that participants had been challenged to see many issues in a new light. Through the course of our final reflections, two very strong messages emerged again and again. First, everything is connected: food, poverty, prejudice, housing, immigration, the environment, human rights… Second, we are all one. There is no “us” and there is no “them,” rather we are all part of the body of Christ, and as such we must continue to work together in community for peace and for justice.