Sex Trafficking and Courage For Freedom (Kelly Franklin part 1)

As a young Torontonian living in an upscale neighbourhood, Kelly lived with the secrecy of sexual abuse. Fuelled by her insecurities she took to the street with a vengeance. Her associations would eventually lead to her being trafficked.

Today Kelly Franklin leads Courage For Freedom, an organization committed to ending trafficking in Canada and helping its victims find a new life of healing and recovery.

Learn more at www.courageforfreedom.org

Kelly is available to speak and can be reached through office@courageforfreedom.org

Meet The Transformers - QUEST Conversation (part 2)

Robert D. Lupton wrote a book entitled ‘Toxic Charity: How Churches and Charities Hurt Those They Help’. In the book he has this intriguing quote:

“Giving to those in need what they could be gaining from their own initiative may well be the kindest way to destroy people. We mean well, our motives are good, but we have neglected to conduct care-full due diligence to determine emotional, economic, and cultural outcomes on the receiving end of our charity. Why do we miss this crucial aspect in evaluating our charitable work? Because, as compassionate people, we have been evaluating our charity by the rewards we receive through service, rather than the benefits received by the served. We have failed to adequately calculate the effects of our service on the lives of those reduced to objects of our pity and patronage.”

So, what do you think? How do we move from creating dependency on services to supporting initiative in the people you are helping? And how do we promote the vision of the organization in ways that dignify the people that we are committed to serve?

Kevin Coghill is a pastor and staff member at Royal City Mission in downtown Guelph. Their tagline is to ‘Make the Invisible Visible’.

When I was a youth pastor in Exeter, I would bring some of my youth and our musicians to help at Ark Aid Street Mission in downtown London. That was a place that had a great influence on my later decision to move to Windsor and start New Song Church. Ark Aid Mission outgrow the little storefront and moved into larger quarters in later years. One of its directors was the recently retired Doug Whitelaw and the one replacing him was Sarah Campbell.

After I moved to Windsor to begin New Song Church, I became acquainted with Mike Morency. He would leave his youth pastorate in Kitchener and move back to his hometown of Windsor and join as part of the pastoral team in our first few years as a new church.

Eventually he would return to University of Windsor and get his degree in social work. After working in the field, he returned to a faith-based organization named Matthew House, a residence that assists refugee claimants as they integrate into Canadian society. Mike then led them from a three-bedroom bungalow to a complex that can house many more.

Our very first podcast in season 1 was with Rodger Fordham, director of Feeding Windsor. What started with a handful of people at a downtown Presbyterian church then migrated over to New Song Church where I pastor, once the starting church closed for good. Together we have witnessed the growth of Feeding Windsor.

Links:

Part 1 of this interview:

https://www.sidewalkskylinepodcast.com/sidewalkskylinepodcast/meet-the-transformers-quest-conversation-part-1

Rodger Fordham - Feeding Windsor interview

https://www.sidewalkskylinepodcast.com/sidewalkskylinepodcast/windsors-little-church-with-a-big-kitchen

Royal City Mission, Guelph ON

https://www.royalcitymission.ca/

Ark Aid Mission, London ON

https://arkaidmission.com/

Matthew House, Windsor ON

http://matthewhousewindsor.org/

Feeding Windsor

http://www.feedingwindsor.ca/

Sidewalk Pastors - QUEST Conversation (part 2)

In the second part of the Sidewalk Pastors interview, we talk about the stereotypes around poverty and the spiritual formation that is grossly neglected in the field of social work. We will hear more amazing stories about real life people and their courageous struggles.

Our guests are great examples of Street Ministry Workers (letter “S” in our QUEST acronym).

If you have not listened, to part 1 please go back and listen to that first to get a proper introduction to our guests Bob Gal, Anna Morgante and Ejay Tupe.

Links:

Mission Canada

https://paoc.org/canada

Bob Gal

https://paoc.org/canada/workers/bobgal

Anna Morgante

https://paoc.org/canada/workers/annamorgante

Ejay Tupe

https://paoc.org/canada/workers/ejaytupe

Windsor's Little Church With A Big Kitchen

Welcome to the first ever episode of Sidewalk Skyline. I’m your host Kevin Rogers and I have lived most of my life in Canadian cities, well… at least in Ontario cities. In this podcast we are going to feature men and women from across Canada doing some extraordinary work in the places they live.

So where am I from? I live in Windsor, Ontario where the church I planted is celebrating 26 years of loving our neighbours, especially those living on the margins of society.

Today’s pilot episode is an interview with Rodger Fordham, director of Feeding Windsor. If I didn’t have the privilege of working alongside Rodger, I would still think this a great place to start our investigation of what God is up to in Canadian cities.

In 5 years, this outreach has had a meteoric rise to 200,000 meal servings for this upcoming year. You are going to hear how a small church can partner with others to make a large dent in the city through hospitality.

Links:

www.feedingwindsor.ca

  http://newsongwindsor.blogspot.com/

https://paoc.org/canada/workers/priorityurbancentres

https://paoc.org/canada/about/staff/lists/mc-staff/urban-coordinator

Feeding Windsor is an outreach agency of New Song Church focused on providing a table in food deserts, hospitality in neighbourhoods and strategies of food empowerment in our city. More details are on our website at www.feedingwindsor.ca