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If you’re passing Beach United Church, look for our new pantry box that invites you to give what you can, take what you need. Inspired by Toronto Little Free Pantries Project, it’s a way for everyone to help out, and to be helped, in our community.

Church volunteers will stock the pantry. We also encourage our neighbours to contribute items if they are able. See below for suggested items to donate.

Anyone is welcome to take what they need from the pantry. 

While the pantry won’t solve the growing problem of hunger in Toronto, we hope it will be a small but meaningful way to make a difference by demonstrating trust, generosity and mutual aid.

We’re grateful to the many people who helped bring our pantry from an idea to reality. In particular, thanks to Dale who shared his time, skill and materials to build it!

Beach United Church helps people who are hungry in other ways too. Each week from September to June, Beach United volunteers serve a community meal as part of the Beach Interfaith Lunch Program. We also continue to support the work of the Out of the Cold shelter program hosted at St. Aidan’s Anglican Church.

If you’re interested in contributing to the pantry, here are some suggestions:

• canned food (but not in subzero weather to avoid bursting cans)
• pasta and rice
• cereal
• granola bars
• hygiene products
• baby food (to avoid spoilage, please only donate baby food when the weather isn’t too hot or below freezing)

Packaging should be unopened and in good condition. If the pantry is full, please bring your donations another day.

This past summer The Racial Justice Action Group has been reading and making lists of some great books to share.

The list is broken down into Non-Fiction, Fiction, Children’s Storybooks, Chapter Books, Teen Books and even Poetry for Indigenous authors and Black and other authors of colour.

Some of the books we’ve read, some we’ve heard good things about and some of the books come from reading lists from The Toronto Public Library and The New York Times. We certainly haven’t drafted a complete list but it’s a start. We hope you’ll look at the list, maybe pick a few titles to read this fall/winter and make your own recommendations.

The desire of sharing this reading list is to encourage people to read and think about racial justice issues raised in the books and then to talk about them with friends and family.
Sharing good books is one way we can all embrace diversity and ensure racial justice in our own community. Another way is to join the Racial Justice Group where we have great discussions about promoting racial justice. Open to all.

Mary Anne Lemm
maryanne.alton@sympatico.ca

Reading List

Indigenous authors:

Fiction:
Johnny Appleseed by Joshua Whitehead
Ragged Company – Richard Wagamese
Indian Horse – Richard Wagamese
Starlight – Richard Wagamese
Medicine Walk – Richard Wagamese
One Story, One Song – short story collection – Richard Wagamese
Five Little Indians – Michelle Good
The Break – Katherena Vermette
Chasing Painted Horses by Drew Hayden Taylor
In Search of April Raintree by Beatrice Mosionier
Porcupines and China Dolls by Robert Arthur Alexie
Up Ghost River by Edmund Metatawabin
Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson
Son of a Trickster by Eden Robinson
The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline (young adult book)

Non-Fiction:
A Mind Spread Out On The Ground by Indigenous author Alicia Elliott
The Education of Augie Merasty by Joseph Auguste Merasty with David Carpenter
From the Ashes -Jesse Thistle
21 things you may not know about the Indian Act : Helping Canadians Make Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples a Reality by Bob Joseph
Seven Fallen Feathers by Tanya Talaga
In My Own Moccasins memoir by Helen Knott
Broken Circle is a memoir by Theodore Fontaine
The Reason You Walk by Wab Kinew
Inconvenient Indian by Thomas King
Aboriginal Narrative Practice by Barbara Wingard

Poetry:
Embers: One Ojibway’s Meditations by Richard Wagamese
The Red Flies poetry by Lisa Bird-Wilson

Teen Books:
As long as the Rivers Flow is a middle-grade book by Larry Loyie
7 Generations is a graphic novel by David A. Robertson
Betty is a graphic novel written by David A. Robertson
The Barren Grounds graphic novel by David Robertson

Children’s storybooks:
Can Make This Promise by Christine Day
We Sang You Home, written by Richard Van Camp and illustrated by Julie Flett (board book)
Stolen Words is a picture book by Melanie Florence
The Orange Shirt by Phyllis Webstad age 7-10
Shi-shi-etko and Shin-chi’s Canoe by Nicola I. Campbell and illustrated by Kim LaFave
A Day with Yayah, written by Nicola I. Campbell, illustrated by Julie Flett
Owls See Clearly at Night is a picture book by illustrator and author Julie Flett
Amik Loves School is the seventh book in the Seven Teachings Stories series by Katherena Vermette
Just a Walk, written by Jordan Wheeler
My Name is Seepeetza by Shirley Sterling
Dear Canada, These Are My Words: The Residential School Diary of Violet Pesheens by Ruby Slipperjack
The Train is a book by Jodie Callaghan, illustrated by Georgia Lesley
Fatty Legs: A True Story, A Stranger at Home, Not My Girl and When I Was Eight by Christy Jordan-Fenton and Margaret Pokiak-Fenton
I Am Not a Number by Jenny Kay Dupuis
In When We Were Alone and Sugar Falls by David A. Robertson
You Hold Me and Speaking Our Truth by Monique Gray Smith
What’s My Superpower by Aviaq Johnston
They Called Me Number One is a memoir by Bev Sellars

Black Authors:

Fiction:
The Polished Hoe by Austin Clarke -fiction
The Book of Negroes – Lawrence Hill -fiction
The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

Non-Fiction:
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Long Time Coming: Reckoning with Race in America by Michael Eric Dyson
Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man by Emmanuel Acho
How to be an Anti-Racist by Ibram X. Kendi
The Skin We’re In by Desmond Cole
Can You Hear Me Now by Celina Caesar-Chavannes
Viola Demond’s Canada by Graham Reynolds
Black Life: Post BLM and the Struggle for Freedom by Rinaldo Walcott
Conversations with White People by IC Bailey
Do Better: Spiritual Activism for Fighting and Healing from White Supremacy by Rachel Ricketts
I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown
Me and White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad
Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from slavery to present by Robyn Maynard
So You Want to Talk about Race by Ijeoma Oluo
This is The Fire by Don Lemon
Why I’m no longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge
The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah
Saga Boy: My life of Blackness and Becoming by Antonio Michael Downing
Finish This Sentence by Leslie Roach
Uncle: Race Nostalgia, and the Politics of Loyalty by Cheryl Thompson
My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakem
Love is the Way: Holding on to Hope in Troubling Times by Bishop Michael Curry (American)
Caste: the Origins of our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson (American)
I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You: a Letter to My Daughter by David Chariandy (Canadian)

Other BIPOC Authors:
Scarborough by Catherine Hernandez
Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Author writing about Racism:
White Fragility Why It’s so Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin Diangelo

Children’s BIPOC storybooks:
The Proudest Blue: A Story of Hijab and Family by Ibtihaj Muhammad
All The Colors We Are: The Story of How We Get Our Skin Color by Katie Kissinger
Intersection Allies: We Make Room for All by Chelsea Johnson, LaToya Council and Carolyn Choi
I am Enough by Grace Byers
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Boy by Tony Medina
Freedom River by Doreen Rappaport
We are Family by LeBron James

Chapter Books:
Harbor Me by Jacqueline Woodson
What Lane by Torrey Maldonado
The Undefeated by Kwame Alexander

For Teens:
Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi
American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang
Just Mercy: A true Story of the Fight for Justice by Bryan Stevenson

Nine Religious Groups unite to insert religious values into the political debate.

Faith groups have combined to organize a federal candidates’ meeting, with differences, for the riding of Beaches-East York on Tuesday September 14th, 2021. The Church of the Resurrection will host the Zoom event at 7:00 PM.

One difference is that candidates are being asked to respond to questions on themes of the climate emergency and social equity. The organizers have asked the candidates to go beyond statements on the party platform and to articulate how their response would affect Beaches-East York.

The second difference is that the faith groups have included a preamble to each theme area stating the religious principles that frame the questions in an ethical as well as political context. Candidates have been asked to include an explanation of how and why their political messages address these values, in their responses.

The third difference is that the organizers requested that the candidates focus on addressing the questions and not on attacking other parties or personalities.

Invitations have been sent to the candidates of all the major parties competing in the riding of Beaches-East York. Invitations were based on whether the parties currently have representatives in parliament or whether they have nominated candidates in at least 80% of Canadian ridings.

The audience will join online at: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88684751033?pwd=UUpNMExDa1lydERqNnlEcUJFd2Y0dz09

In addition to the questions from the organizers questions will be taken from Zoom participants during the evening and compiled to ask the candidates.

The religious communities organizing this event include St. Aidan’s Anglican, Beach United, Beach Hebrew Institute, Calvary Baptist Church, Church of the Resurrection, Anglican, Danforth Mennonite Church, St. John’s Norway Anglican, Kingston Road United, Toronto United Mennonite Church.

For more information:

Michael Van Dusen
416-570-0203
mjpvandusen@gmail.com

Christina Blizzard
christina.blizzard@gmail.com

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. – We must come to see that human progress never rolls in on the wheels of inevitability.  It comes through the tireless efforts and the persistent work of dedicated individuals who are willing to be co-workers with God.  And without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the primitive forces of social stagnation.  So we must help time and realize that the time is always ripe to do right.
Reprinted in Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man from a speech in Washington D.C. March 68.

Concerned about Racial Justice?
Over the last year we’ve been learning more about systemic racism and how painful it has been to Black, Indigenous and other people of colour.

Once you know — you can’t unknow but now what do you do about it?

This is an invitation to be part of a small working group of committed people who want to work on actions of inclusion and reconciliation within the BUC and broader community.  The Environmental Action Committee is an example of how small actions can lead to progress. 

Please join us and be part of positive change.

Contact Mary Anne Lemm maryanne.alton@sympatico.ca
or Karen Dale karen@beachuc.com

Quote from Jesse Thistle FB page — Author of From the Ashes July/21
Thanks to those who took a little time to reflect on Canada Day. I got my haircut yesterday – the first in months – and all the factory workers and barbers in the Crow’s Nest shop were wearing orange. These were regular-ass white middle-aged Tim Horton-drinking Canadian factory workers taking the time to honour, one of them said, the lives lost, the bodies discovered. That’s something. I have never seen anything like this in my whole life, regular people caring and standing up for Indigenous people. Thank you to those guys in the barbershop and everyone else who stood up. Things are starting to change. Mega respect to my boy Tristan.