Farewell to the leader - Barry Babcook, 1957-2014

Over the past several years, I've written quite a few "farewells" to people we have known through The Lord's Rain and Gospel Mission and who have passed on, like Barry Smith, "Junior", Tina, Pete, Richard's "ol' lady", and others.

I never thought I'd be writing this one.

Barry Babcook, senior pastor at Gospel Mission for the past 18 years, died Monday night at the age of 56. About a month ago, he was diagnosed with cancer in multiple parts of his body. It's hard to say why it went unnoticed for so long -- what symptoms were noticed were put down to other things; but by the time he went for surgery to remove the tumor from his colon, it was so far advanced there was nothing doctors could do except leave him sedated and on life support.

That was on Saturday. This afternoon, they removed the life support, and just after 7 pm, he was gone.

Barry had actually ministered on the Downtown East Side since he was a teenager, freshly delivered from some pretty evil stuff, himself. He started out as a street preacher -- his wife, Judy, recalls that their first date was preaching in Gastown on a Saturday night. Barry's "sermons" mainly consisted of declaring, "Jesus loves you!" to the alcoholics and homeless. I never heard him preach on hellfire and damnation -- although he never denied that part of it -- but he kept coming back to that simple, eternal message that, whatever the "world" might think of you, God loves you to the end. I see other street preachers around Vancouver -- usually on Granville Mall -- who hit the "sinners burn in hell" message pretty hard, and I wonder how many people they're really reaching and how many just walk on by, their ears dull of hearing and their eyes closed (Matt. 13:15). But I know this: countless people came to know the Lord because of Barry's loving, persistent message.

Barry and Judy ministered for several years in Taiwan, while Barry taught English. They adopted their two children -- Sheri from Taiwan, Anthony from a reserve on Northern Vancouver Island. Judy leads Worship at the Gospel Mission Sunday services, Sheri cooks in the kitchen and Anthony, who has grown into a strong young man of God (and a rock through this recent time) often preaches the sermon. Barry was also one of the driving forces behind The Rock Church, which would meet in the Mission on Sunday evenings: he called it a "Jesus jam session", with music, prayer, teaching and general all-around Worship.  

Some of the other uses for 327 Carrall
have been less "convenient" for us
than the grocery store.

One of the temptations on the Downtown East Side is to get caught up in the politics and activism there. With so much despair in the area, it's easy to cry out about injustice and inequality and demand that someone else do something about it; sometimes, that involves defying the laws of the land. The problem is, the Bible commands us to obey those laws, regardless of how we feel about those laws. Barry somehow managed to stay above that, emerging more as an "actionist" -- someone who does what he or she can to address those issues -- and I believe that's what has made Gospel Mission unique and helped it thrive over the years. 

Not that there weren't battles -- maybe "skirmishes" is a better word. In recent years, the Sunday street market -- where people from the area gather in Pigeon Park to hawk items of questionable provenance -- has been a particular bugaboo. Barry constantly had to make sure the pathway to the Mission door was kept clear so people could come to the services; he also had to pester City Hall to install portable toilets so people wouldn't relieve themselves in the alley. Inside the building, he had to deal with the anarchist "resistance" group that occupied one of the ground floor spaces for several years, and before that, the space was a needle exchange and a "supervised" drug injection site, before that was made legal and moved elsewhere. Barry prayed constantly for the people involved with those endeavors, that they would come to know the Lord. As many of you know, the night that he changed his prayer to pray that the new tenants would be Christians was one of the early signs that The Lord's Rain should come into being. That was the same night that I had mentioned to Amelia that it would be great if there was some way to provide showers for people in the area because obviously, anything that was available wasn't adequate.

With a variety of skilled tradespeople
stepping up to build The Lord's Rain,
Barry helped keep things coordinated.

It was in the building of The Lord's Rain that Barry's gifts came into play. He was an electrician by trade and a handyman -- you could say that he held the Mission together, literally as well as figuratively. If something needed to be fixed, he got it done, even if it was, technically, the landlord's responsibility. With The Lord's Rain, if I was the one who received the direction, like Moses, Barry was Bezaleel, the one skilled in the crafts needed to build it (Exodus, chapter 31). Barry was the one who put out the "fleece" (see the explanation below), that is, asking for a specific sign that it should go ahead: "So long as the money is there," he said, "we're in." 

Barry (thinks): "I'm nuts.
That's it: I must be nuts."

Barry knew the practical side of things. As we took over the space, Barry started scoping out the work to be done right away. As the project progressed and I raised funds and preened for the cameras, he quarterbacked things, knowing exactly what was needed, what questions to ask, what permits we required and how to get it all. He worked with people like Brodie Collins (plumber), Murray Scott (building contractor), and Gerry Wall and his sons, Brandon and Jordan (also builders) to coordinate the tasks. He ensured that every permit was in order, every inspection done.

The accidental archaeologist

And there was the physical work, like jackhammering through the century-old concrete foundation to replace the pipe from the city water main. When he finally cracked through, he dug down with his hands, and as he reached the pipe, discovered two things: an oyster shell and a handful of ashes.

The 300 block Carrall Street is on the site of what had been an aboriginal village around the time Vancouver was founded. And 331 Carrall Street was built in 1888, two years after the Great Vancouver Fire. You didn't need a history degree to figure out where those ashes came from. 

300-blk Carrall St., before the fire

We joked that if any antiquarians heard about it, they'd slap a stop-work order on us. Still, to be on the safe side, we took a moment to touch the ashes and the shell and connect with history, then put them back. Once the pipe was replaced, the section was re-concreted.

Barry may have shied away from the spotlight, but when we hit our financial crisis a year ago, he was able to reach out to the right people for funding we needed to stay afloat until something more secure could come in. Just before Christmas, he sent a concise but compelling letter to churches in the Apostolic Church of Pentecost, which founded Gospel Mission in 1929, detailing the current fund-matching arrangement with the R. Howard Webster Foundation. The response has been a true blessing.

Gospel Mission/The Lord's Rain today

In Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Mark Antony states, "The evil that men do lives after them/The good is oft interrèd with their bones." That doesn't apply with Barry. I can't think of any "evil" associated with Barry, and won't, even after the initial grief has worn off; the good he has done will continue to live and manifest in ways we could never imagine. It starts with the people he directly witnessed to and counselled over nearly 40 years, continues with the hope those people gained and the others they have affected as a result; it's particularly so with The Lord's Rain, where countless people will be blessed by that outreach for years and years to come.

As we stood around in Barry's room at Ridge Meadows Hospital Monday morning, Anthony, and Stan Powers, pastor at Sonrise Church in Surrey and secretary of the Gospel Mission Society Board, recalled a piece of Scripture, which we all agreed was Barry's "life verse".

By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him.

-- 1 John 3:16-18

-------

* 

"Putting out a fleece" refers to asking God for a specific sign that He will bless something that seems unlikely otherwise. 

In the Book of Judges, Gideon believes God has called him to go to battle against the Midianites, even though his own army is seriously outnumbered. So he tells God that he will set out a fleece overnight: if, in the morning, the fleece is wet and the ground around it dry, he'll know God will give them victory. The next day, 

the ground is dry, but Gideon

 wrings a bowlful of water out of the fleece. 

Note: there is still time to have your financial contribution doubled through the Webster Foundation's fund-matching plan. Funds raised through March 31, 2014 will be matched up to $10,000. You can donate online at www.gospelmission.net, or mail a cheque to  

Gospel Mission Society, PO Box 98802 The W PO, Vancouver, BC V6B 0M4

A great "AHA!" - What is the opposite of poverty?

And when John had heard in prison about the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples and said to Him, "Are You the coming One, or do we look for another?"

Jesus answered and said to them, 'Go and tell John the things which you hear and see: the blind see and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up and the poor have the Gospel preached to them. And blessed is he who is not offended because of Me.'"
-- Matt. 11:2-6

We feed them, we give them shelters: what's missing?

Something has been bugging me for quite a few years, now. On the Downtown East Side -- and indeed, in impoverished areas in general -- there is always talk of "social justice": housing the homeless, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, etc. etc. The talk in Vancouver became particularly loud and fervent during the 2010 Winter Olympics, when a movement called "Share the Gold" (I think it was) was founded, purportedly to raise awareness about the poverty issues manifesting in the very shadow of two of the main Olympic venues (three, if you include the North Shore mountains, where many of the skiing events were held).

Some churches got involved (this is not to be confused with "More Than Gold", an international Christ-based outreach to take advantage of the huge influx of people in the region and bring the Gospel to them by any means possible), so I rang up one of the organizers to see if I could be involved.

I explained that, during my ministry on the DTES, I had learned that the big problem there -- beyond housing, food, income, etc. -- was a lack of hope; by bringing the Gospel to the people in that neighborhood, we can restore the hope they need to turn their lives around. I offered to share that perspective with them.

"I affirm what you're doing," the chap said, "but ..."

I can't remember exactly what came after the "but", but it had something to do with the need to focus attention on the problems and demand something be done about it -- especially with all the wealth supposedly generated by the Olympics.

(I can't stand it, by the way, when someone says they "affirm" something. Very patronizing, don't you think?)

Mind you, I'm not one to condemn anyone for being patronizing -- lately, I've looked at feeding programs and shelters and clothing giveaways and thought, "anyone can do that -- where's Jesus in all this?" I've held my tongue, because I kept thinking those thoughts themselves seemed judgmental and self-righteous. But that didn't stop my feeling there was something missing.

Then came the Aha! moment this morning. Look at how Jesus affirms the presence of God among them:

Blind can't see ... and now they do.

Deaf can't hear ... and now they do.

Lepers are unclean ... and now they're cleansed.

Lame can't walk ... and now they do.

The dead are no longer alive ... and now they are.

The poor ... have the Gospel preached to them.

Jesus lists poverty alongside blindness, deafness, leprosy, lameness and death; and while He lists sight, hearing, cleansing, walking and life as the opposites of those first five, He states that hearing the Gospel is the opposite of being poor.

And note that He doesn't say "poor in spirit," as He says in Matthew 5:3 -- and which some say is a qualifier for His concept of poor. As I read that, He's talking about poor in spirit and poor in worldly resources.

Without the Gospel, where is the hope people need to move forward? Without that intangible "something" to strive for, how can people press towards the greatness that God has for them, when the world is writing them off as incurable? As we preach the Gospel to the poor, help them to know Jesus intimately and to trust in God with all they have, we help them to seek God and His Kingdom; as we do that, all the physical needs they have will be met. That's a solid promise from the Lord (Matt. 7:7-11) with no ifs, ands or buts.

More to the point, withholding the Gospel judges the poor by saying they're not worthy of a better life -- and who would want to be accused of that? "The destruction of the poor is their poverty" (Prov. 10:15).

And that's what's missing. That may explain why, five years after "Share the Gold" and "Riot 2010"; four years after the Occupy movement attempted to overthrow the world order, we still have abject poverty less than three miles away from multi-million-dollar homes and the world's wealth is still pretty much in the hands of a handful of people. In both instances, preaching the Gospel was not part of the equation. 

As human beings, we're wired to want to fix things that don't seem right to us. But as followers of Christ, we have to re-wire ourselves so that the first priority is to preach the Gospel and minister Hope; and trust God to be good to His Word and provide all the things that are needed.

When people know ...

In the six years that we've been working on The Lord's Rain, there's a phenomenon I've seen repeatedly: when people know about it, they want to support it. People want to help out with the situation on the Downtown East Side, but in tight economic times, they want to make sure their money has an impact. When they see a facility dedicated to helping the urban poor and that is demonstrably helping to bring change to people's lives, they want to get on board.

In 2013, we nearly had to close The Lord's Rain due to lack of funding, but all it took was a little bit of media exposure, and people rallied round. Less than a week after stories broke in Metro and on CityTV, we had enough to keep going for over another year. Other items on Radio-Canada and in The Province helped a lot, too.

Now, a new financial blessing will provide another opportunity for people to contribute, knowing that their dollars will be doubled. The R. Howard Webster Foundation is providing a grant of $10,000.00, and is offering to match funds raised between now and March 31, 2014, up to an additional $10,000.00. In other words, this could generate as much as $30,000.00 -- enough to keep The Lord's Rain alive until almost the end of 2015. 

What I really like about this, is that it helps us meet short-term financial needs (the arrangement takes effect in June, when another grant is due to run out) while maintaining what I believe has been the key to the success of The Lord's Rain: "collaborative caring". The Lord's Rain has been built and sustained by many people and organizations, bringing what they can, as they can, motivated by a desire to provide hope to people in an area where hope is the most precious commodity.

I intend to start visiting churches and other organizations with the presentation I gave at Westpointe last summer, and if you are led to make a donation, you can do so online at www.gospelmission.net or by mail. Donations specifically marked for "The Lord's Rain" will go towards the fund-matching program. Please make your cheque or money order payable to Gospel Mission Society, and we have a new mailing address:

Gospel Mission Society,

PO Box 98802

The W PO*

Vancouver, BC V6B 0G0

The name of the game is instilling hope in people: Hope in Christ -- the recognition that their situations are not as good as it gets. Without Hope, why would anyone try to get off drugs, seek treatment for their issues, move forward in their lives? The Downtown East Side is too full of hope-destroying things -- reminders of the past, temptations of the present and deniers of the future -- and people need something else to grasp onto. The Lord's Rain helps people find that "something else".

---

*Yes, that's "The W PO". Sounds like a plumbing fixture, but it's a post office (PO) located in a complex called "The W", which was built out of the ruins of the Woodward's Department Store, a block away from the Mission. Part of the complex is the iconic neon "W", perched on an Eiffel Tower-like structure on the roof. Hence, "The W", rather than "The Woodwards Complex". It's likely that, as Vancouverites get more familiar and less talkative, it will become known as "The Dub" ... and eventually, simply "The".

Farewell to a friend

2014 starts off with some sad news.

I've mentioned before that one of the ignition points for The Lord's Rain was the day -- two days before the deadline to have funding lined up to take over the ground floor space in our building -- that two phone calls came in. The day before, we had all of $60 set aside for the project to build showers. It was the fall of 2007 and the idea was still incubating. Barry and I had put out a "fleece", à la Gideon -- asking God for a confirming sign -- that, so long as the money was there, we had a "go" project.

And we were prepared to walk away from the idea if the money hadn't come in by mid-December.

Two days before the deadline, there were two phone calls, with pledges totaling $4,000.00. 

One of those calls came from Don Low. Barry and I looked Heavenward and said, "Right then -- we'll take that as a 'yes'."

I didn't know Don and his wife, Joyce, very well. They had been members of Westpointe when I first started going there in 2006, but they were distinctive: certainly the oldest couple there -- Don was in his late 80s at the time -- and they always wore "Sunday best" to church. Don was also distinctive for his puckish sense of humor: he told Amelia and me one time about singing in a Gospel quartet with three Baptist mates in the Royal Canadian Air Force during WW2. They never missed a chance to take the mickey out of him for being Pentecostal, and he, apparently, gave as good as he got. That sense of humor stood him in good stead through these doctrinal differences, since that group still got together to sing long after the war.

Don passed away just before New Year's at the age of 90 or 91. He was a true gentleman, and he and Joyce continued to support The Lord's Rain over the years, with prayer, quiet encouragement and timely contributions. I'm sure Don's legacy takes many forms in many different areas, but The Lord's Rain is part of it, and will stand the Downtown East Side has benefited -- and will continue to do so -- from his and Joyce's kindness, generosity and prayers.

"Thank you," somehow, doesn't begin to say it.

Everyone Has A Story

We gotta get outta this place

If it's the last thing we ever do

We gotta get outta this place

'Cause girl, there's a better life for me and you

Those words by that eminent Worship band, Eric Burdon and the Animals, have Biblical connections, whether wittingly or unwittingly. Throughout the Bible, we read about people whose lives moved forward when they moved on. Abram (as he was then called) was commanded by God to leave his home in Ur near what was later Babylon and go to a different and potentially hostile place. "Arise, Joseph," Gabriel told the carpenter, "take Mary and the Babe to Egypt and stay there until those who seek His life have died." The other Joseph, he of the coat of many colors, was forcibly removed from his comfortable place as Jacob's favorite son: sold to some passing merchants and later in Egypt traded for purple, incense, and a eunuch to be named later.*

I ran into Albert this past Sunday. With his slightly misshapen head and speech impediment caused by having no teeth, he could easily be written off as a "typical" Downtown East Sider, possibly with a lower-than-average IQ.

He's not. Trust me.

He used to be a regular at The Lord's Rain. Polite, kindly, unassuming; he would come in and shower and shave and hang about to chat with us. Then one day, he announced proudly that he had a new place and was moving in.

The new place is in a condo project at 1st Avenue and Main Street. 1st is a few blocks beyond what I would call the outside edge of the Downtown East Side, and as I understand it, the project got the goahead, in part, because of the "social housing" component. Albert has a small, self-contained studio apartment - and so we don't see him in the neighbourhood much anymore.

I was waiting for a bus to go to church and Albert was en route to First Baptist Church, where they lay on a big breakfast for the poor on Sundays (not sure if it's every Sunday or certain ones, like just before Welfare Wednesday). We chatted a bit about where we were going and what the breakfast was like, and then I asked him, "So how's the new place working out?"

"It's great," he said. "I got my own kitchen and bathroom and it's really clean."

I mentioned that another chap I knew also had a place in the same building but there had been problems with drug addicts and dealers.

"Maybe on his floor," Albert replied. "Our (electronic key) cards only get us onto our floor. Mine's great."

The other fellow had pointed out that the dealers had managed to disable some of the locking functions and were able to move about.

"I've complained [to the people in charge of screening the residents] about the situation," Albert went on, "but they tell us, 'addicts need a place to live, too'."

"So do you," I pointed out.

Albert gave a sort of "it is what it is" shrug, and, with my bus arriving, we said our goodbyes.

Probably the biggest advantage to Albert's place is that IT'S NOT ON THE DOWNTOWN EAST SIDE. Many of the people I meet there would like nothing better than to get the heck out of there. As I wrote on another occasion, Marty summed it up by saying it's too easy to fall back into drugs, when all it takes is a phone call and maybe a half-block walk from your front door. Why would we want to keep people in such proximity to the very things, both the physical presence and the spiritual reminders, of the current state they're in? Life's troubles are only temporary, but in that environment, the present seems so permanent.

The paradox is that there are so many dedicated services on the Downtown East Side for the mentally ill, addicted and chronically sick -- people whose personal stories include workplace injuries from which they've never recovered, diabetes or the effects of longterm alcohol use. Moving away can make those safety nets seem out of reach. But surely there's a way to make those nets mobile and give at least some of the people who need them a better chance at breathing free.

Some years ago at the old Rainbow Mission, I preached a message called "If you don't go -- you won't grow!" One fellow piped up, "What if the only place where you feel like you're accepted is the place you're in?"

He had me there, although from a pure "faith perspective", if God sends you to a place (and that's one of the keys to Abram's experience), then it doesn't matter if people in the area "accept" you or not. Scripture tells us that Abram/Abraham gradually earned the respect of the Canaanites. In this day and age, we're expected to be more accepting of people, so that question should be our problem -- not his. 

***

"You can never hate a man," an old Anglican priest once told me, "once you've talked to him." One of the keys to breaking down that artificial barrier around the DTES is to hear the stories of the people who live there. If you click here, you'll find Segment 1 of an exercise to that end. It's called, "In His image, too ...", and the first installment is the story of Kris Cronk. Over the months to come, you'll see more people who come into The Lord's Rain, telling their stories.

The trick, of course, is to get them to talk. I asked Maggie, a woman who's lived most of the last two years in a doorway on Cordova Street (she finally moved indoors this past week): "No," she said, "it's far too emotional." Ron and Gerald both said, "I'll get back to you." Richard, whose background includes residential schools, has only one word for that experience: "Unspeakable."

Then you get people like Marty. "Great idea," he said. "It'll help clear away some preconceived notions people have about this area." Exactly.

And Kris is eager to get others to do it. He found that, in telling his story -- which he has been doing for Megaphone Magazine -- he's managed to deal with the issues he grew up with and find a way to move forward. He also discovered a talent for writing that he never knew he had. So as more people tell their stories for the camera, I'll let you know when they're posted.

***

"They thought I was dead."

Mike re-surfaced this morning. He is one of many "Mike"s in the area, and the last time I saw him, he was dreadfully sick from alcohol abuse. He had been hoping to get into a recovery program, and part of our prayer that day was for that to happen. Clearly, he was sick of being sick. He was also terrified that he was past the point of no return and was going to die soon.

That was seven months ago. Today, he walked into The Lord's Rain: he was clear-eyed and quiet and one could sense he was different. He had managed to get into recovery, although I didn't ask what program. But apparently none of his friends in the area knew he had gone, so when they didn't see him for a while, they filed a Missing Person report.

"Shows they care about you," I said. "AND ... it shows you stuck with the program."

"Yep," he said. "I'm clean now. My color is back ... I was SO sick, man!"

I reminded him that he'd always have support with us. I hope he realizes that with us, and his friends he apparently didn't know he had, he's not alone in his struggle. Please keep Mike in prayer: he's won a key battle, but the enemy doesn't go away quietly.

***

*OK ... I made that part up ...

A lesson in sharing and caring

We had a "moment" this morning outside The Lord's Rain. Justin and I were standing outside the door, chatting, when a little boy and his daddy came up to us. The boy reached into a bag and pulled out a Hallowe'en treat for each of us.

And they walked on.

They had approached from Hastings Street, and it wasn't hard to figure out what was going on. After a successful night of trick-or-treating, Daddy took the little one (he was maybe 5 or 6 - 7 at most) for a walk through the area where the poor people live. Not only did he see a world considerably different from the one he was growing up in, but it was a chance for him to share what had been given to him and get a glimpse of what it's like when you reach out to others with kindness and absolutely no expectation of anything in return.

Lord, bless that dad for doing that. I don't know his name -- God does -- and there were no cameras or anyone to publicize the event. It was a "just because" thing, sowing seeds not only with the child, but with the people he met on that walk. Who knows what fruit those seeds will produce in years to come?

Harold and Vicky; and good news for Maggie

Bart shook his head. “A man drink like you do,” he said, “he gone die!”

The Kid thought about that for a moment, then said, “When?”

-- from “Blazing Saddles”, 1974 (slightly novelized version)

“He’s been drinkin’ rub,” Sheila said, “and some o’ that!” she added, pointing to an empty bottle of Jack Daniels.

I passed the information on to the ambulance dispatcher. It was Friday morning, and Bruce (who can be seen on our video presentation about The Lord’s Rain) had come into the ministry to get me to call 9-1-1. “Someone’s havin’ a seizure,” he said.

“Rub” is rubbing alcohol, which is usually watered-down or mixed with Listerine, but Sheila insisted that Ashley had been drinking his straight. Ashley was lying on one of the benches, twitching slightly on his left side. He was breathing normally, a fact confirmed when the dispatcher had me watch him and say “now” whenever he took a breath. But the ambulance was on its way and got there in a couple of minutes.

Before they got there, Ashley came to and managed to sit up. “I’m epileptic,” he told me, and a couple of the others said, “he’s OK – he doesn’t need an ambulance.” But Sheila laid down the law. “They need to check him out,” she declared.

It turned out that one of the paramedics knew the patient. “Have another seizure, Ashley?” Ashley nodded. “Want to go to the hospital and get checked out?” “Yeah, I wanna go,” Ashley replied. They walked him to the ambulance and helped him in. As we watched him, Sheila pointed with her foot to the bottle of Jack, almost in wonder at the amount Ashley had put away.

Again, I marvelled at the compassion shown by the paramedics. Not only did one of them know Ashley’s name, but also remembered that he had a broken collarbone, which had not been repaired – probably for the same reason Jim Ritchie hadn’t had surgery to repair his collarbone: too much risk that he would fall, break it again, and get infected.

On Saturday, I strolled over to Pigeon Park again, and there was Ashley, sitting on the same bench, slugging back something from a bottle. I asked him what happened at the hospital. He didn’t really know. “That was Thursday,” he said.

“Friday.”

“No – Thursday. I woke up at home this morning.”

 Nothing I could say would shift him from that belief. Apparently, he’d lost a day due to the stroke.

“Hey – I’m alive,” he said, smiling and taking a pull on a bottle of something dark and strong-looking.

A couple of the others at the park came over and chatted and one, whom I’d never seen before, said, “thank you for praying for us.”

What can one say, besides “you’re welcome”?

I’ve said before: The Lord’s Rain has been serving basic human needs beyond the need to be physically clean. People anywhere – especially in a place like the Downtown East Side – have a basic need to know that they’re in right standing with God. Being prayed for goes a long way to that end.

Anyone can do that, too – although it’s important to offer the prayers in the hope-against-hope that knowing how much God loves them will gradually provide greater comfort than rubbing alcohol, Jack Daniels and whatever Ashley had in that bottle.

===

The word “gradually” is important. My friend, Cal Weber, who leads Campus Ministry at the BCIT (BC Institute of Technology), once noted that water, flowing over a rock, has the same impact as a sledgehammer; it just takes longer. But when the job is done, the rock is completely worn away, without the big chunks a sledgehammer leaves behind. So it is with Ministry.

===

It is six weeks, now, since Vicky, one of our regulars, came into The Lord’s Rain. She bypassed the coffee line, looked at John, Danilo and me and burst into tears. “Harold died this morning,” she said.

Harold was her male companion (for want of a better term: they weren’t married, and “boyfriend” sounds trivial, especially under the circumstances), and she had woken up that morning to find he had passed away in the bed beside her.

On Friday, Vicky was back at The Lord’s Rain, still grieving, carrying with her the little leaflet from the memorial service. She poured her heart out to John, which was actually a good choice, as he had had a similar experience – waking up one morning to find his roommate dead on the kitchen floor – and he is known to people in the area as an excellent listener.

---

How about a little good news?

I have mentioned Maggie before, although I’ve only seen her in The Lord’s Rain once. A very small woman, somewhere between age 45 and 60, she gets around by pushing a wheelchair (although she recently got a walker, which is easier to handle). For the past couple of years, she’s had a little camp in a doorway on Cordova Street, just around the corner from The Lord’s Rain. Last year, the space was renovated into a restaurant and delicatessen, but the proprietors let Maggie stay in the doorway, which isn’t being used, anyway. A gate was installed and Maggie was given the key. Little by little, her camp has grown, with pillows, a sleeping bag and books, and people drop off food for her, or she goes out to find a meal from one of the outreaches.

On Friday, she called me over. “I’m moving into my new place in December,” she announced.

It turns out, she’s had a room at a single-room-occupancy (SRO) hotel called the Marble Arch, which is just outside the DTES. “I’ve been payin’ rent there,” she said, “but I refused to go back until they fixed the place up. It was declared number-one-worst place in the city.”

But now, it appears, the renovations have been done. “I got new furniture and a kitchen with a microwave that works!” It appears that she’d been paying rent for her room at Marble Arch, which held it for her in the mean time. Disabled and ravaged by drug abuse (it’s hard to say which followed the other ) and occasionally subjected to verbal abuse, like the guy who yelled at her, “you brought it on yourself!”, as he blew her off, Maggie is about due for a break.

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(Do you remember a song from the 1980s, called “The Way It Is,” by Bruce Hornsby and The Range? The opening verse describes a homeless guy begging on the street, and someone drives by in a car shouting, “get a job!” We all nodded sagely and opined how awful that was and how true and but it must be someone else who had such a stinking attitude. To borrow Walt Kelly’s overused line, we have met the enemy, and he is us.)

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An article in today’s Vancouver Sun makes interesting reading. It’s on a national study that’s just been released on housing for the mentally ill, and suggests mentally ill people tend to “do better” living in self-contained apartments scattered around the city, rather than in SROs concentrated in a particular area. They benefit, the study suggests, from being around healthier people and socializing more. Interestingly, the NIMBY factor among people already living in these neighbourhoods is not as pervasive as some might have thought.

It reminds me of a remark our friend Marty made a few months ago. “It’s too easy [on the DTES]. I can call a dealer any time, then take two steps outside my door and meet him.” Others consider “getting the heck outta Dodge” to be a main goal in life. The important thing is to impart sufficient hope to them that they will, like Maggie, see that a breakthrough is not just desirable, it’s possible.