Robert Kinghorn

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus told a parable about a fig tree planted in a vineyard which year after year bore no fruit. Finally, the owner was tired of waiting and called upon the gardener to cut it down because it was a waste of space. But the gardener knew that the tree just needed time, patience, and love to heal.

When we first met in a downtown shelter, she was only sixteen and had been sent to Toronto from northern Canada for treatment at a health clinic. Soon she was on the streets of the city with drug and emotional problems and ended up in the shelter where we met.

I have often wondered as I walk on the streets of downtown Toronto on Thursday evenings what memories the streets would leave with someone who is experiencing this area of the city for the first time as darkness descends.

Some evenings I sense there is unrest on the streets even before I get there. This was one such evening. 

By all worldly accounts much of the ministry of The Church on the Street seems like a total waste of time. However, in my more reflective moments I realize that the answer lies somewhere in the mystery that on the street I am constantly surprised by holiness in the midst of addiction, violence, and poverty.

It was a momentous day in history. May 8th 2025. My wife Ria and I celebrated our 49th wedding anniversary.

I have always been a night owl. Even at university I felt that 11 o’clock in the evening was a good time to start cramming for exams the next day. Later I learned that this was not a good way to study, and often the results confirmed it.

The Canadian communication expert Marshall McLuhan made famous the phrase, “The medium is the message" by which he meant that the way a message is delivered has a significant impact on how it is received. But what if the medium is one of the people of the beatitudes: the poor, the addicts, the isolated, and the homeless?