Last spring, we wrote about how Vancouver churches are responding to the physical and spiritual hunger that COVID-19 is highlighting through community food programs, and through growing food. As the infection rate increases, we continue to feverishly figure out how…
Last week we wrote about how Vancouver churches are responding through community food programs to the physical and spiritual hunger that COVID-19 is exacerbating. Prior to the pandemic, approximately one in 10 households in British Columbia were experiencing inadequate or…
Three local groups have developed an important new resource for churches that want to support their neighbours. A Table for All is a 90-page “toolkit for community meals in a framework of food justice.” Karen Giesbrecht and Winston Green of…
Restrictions, closures and social distancing affect all of us – but none more than vulnerable populations clustered in the Downtown Eastside but increasingly found throughout Metro Vancouver. Groups like The Salvation Army, Union Gospel Mission and community meal hosts are…
Since 2011, CityGate Leadership Forum has coordinated the Planted Community Food Network to help seed a cultural shift in Greater Vancouver away from haphazard food charity, toward a sustainable local food system – opening access to affordable nutrition by building on the…
Karen Giesbrecht coordinates several community meals at churches around Vancouver. Some of the participants struggle with addictions, and she is concerned with the implications of easier access to marijuana promised by all levels of government. On a recent Monday evening,I…
We know we should pray for and be concerned with the needs of the community in which we live. It’s a tall order to figure out where to begin, but this fall a few of us have discovered a useful…
A group of local citizens has invited Pope Francis to visit Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside; now it’s just a matter of waiting to see whether he will come. The interfaith group which sent the pope a letter includes Roman Catholic, United,…