Care for Others

Caring for others?  Doesn’t it go without saying:  that’s what church is supposed to do?

Traditional church calls it “mission” and the United Church of Canada still has a “Mission and Service Fund.”  But the church’s “mission” has a checkered history.  It has come to be associated with dirty words, like proselytism, colonialism,  empire, paternalism, conversion, crusade.

In fact, more than ten years ago, former United Church of Canada moderator, Bill Phipps, announced that the national church was intentionally rejecting proselytism.  In a moment of honesty, we acknowledged that it does more harm than good to persuade people that we have a better way of doing things.  The claim just doesn’t stand up.

So how can we help to make the world a better place without falling into the mission trap that snared our predecessors?

It begins by rejigging how we think about the “other.”  So long as we preoccupied ourselves with persuading, we held ourselves over and against those who had to suffer our good intentions.  It’s time to think of ourselves as standing shoulder-to-shoulder with equal partners in the pursuit of common goals.  It means that we have to be constantly vigilant of our motives.  It also means that we have to do far more listening.

Habitat for Humanity

For several years, now, West Hill has been involved with Habitat for Humanity projects in Toronto. Down the street, in the back yards of some of our own congregants, a controversial build is happening right now.  Ten years in the planning, the build was made possible by the purchase of the land by a women's religious order.  Community members, many of whom had had access to the public land through their own backyards, were incensed and, even now, continue to rail against the development.  Our own church lost a family because of our support of the project.

On May 6th, Gretta participated in the first Habitat Toronto Women Build and joined 180 other women to hammer away at both houses that needed to be built and the prejudice and stereotypes community members have about Habitat housing.  Inspired by the stories of families finding hope through their work at Habitat, the 500 hours of sweat equity that has to be donated to Habitat by those who move into a home and the images of happy children playing in neighbouring parks and community centres, West Hil has committed to be part of this an many more builds.  If you'd like to participate in a Habitat Build, contact Habitat Toronto or call our office, 416-282-8566.

Two blocks away from the church, the Volkway build is now home to 14 families who once lived in substandard housing. Volunteers erected the houses over the course of many months of supervised work. On one very rainy summer day, West Hill volunteers fed the builders with a full hot chili meal, humour and a warm smile. The following summer, it was deli sandwiches and salads at the McLevin Woods build. This year it is snacks during the Women Build and hammers in the fall.

A new site has been purchased almost direcly across the street from West Hill and we eagerly await the opportunity to, once again, become involved in making hope another home.