Parables Of Community

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto.

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto. "What was it in their hearts that moved the Myrrh-bearing women to do something against common sense?"

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, serving the most vulnerable in Toronto. "Jesus tells Mary Magdalene that He will meet His disciples in Galilee. That is the place where the community is fully alive having Christ in their midst. The place where you work, you celebrate, you heal the sick and feed the hungry with the Lord. The place where you break bread and drink good wine with the Lord and go fishing with no worry that you’ll toil all night without catching anything. The place where you take care of the sick and cure the demoniacs; where you celebrate the feast of marriage, plant, prune and harvest. The place where you learned what it means to be thankful for being alive because you tasted from life in abundance. Most of the time, life at the mission is called to find and to become a Galilee where the Lord can feel at home."

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, still open and serving the most vulnerable in Toronto. "The light is breaking through any human heart. Wherever the heart might be. It finds any crack to break through. There is so much light at the mission because the people who come here are so broken. So the light is visible in abundance. So is our dear community. Broken, so that the light of Pascha can be received through the cracks. Even if you want to hide it and contain it you cannot help but share it. So broken and imperfect we are."

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, still open and serving the most vulnerable in Toronto. "Never has the church worldwide celebrated Pascha in this way, as we will this year. Abstinence not only from sin but from things that are good in themselves creates an empty space where God can act and surprise us. Could this not be the unexpected grace that is waiting for us in the empty tomb this year? What if the church is called this year to risk living something new, unfamiliar, even surprising?"

Listen to excerpts from this past Sunday's bulletin at St. John the Compassionate Mission, still open and serving the most vulnerable in Toronto. "This becomes a time when we get to experience what real life has been for others. We are receiving the good news of the Resurrection so we can witness and testify for the sake of those who do not know when the darkness is going to end, to those who have not seen the dawn just yet."

Meet Chris and Laura, two of the treasures at the Mission. Taken from Walking Humbly: The Holiness of the Poor, by St. John the Compassionate Mission.

Meet William and Jane, two of the treasures at the Mission. Taken from Walking Humbly: The Holiness of the Poor, by St. John the Compassionate Mission.

Meet Ruth, one of the treasures at the Mission. Taken from Walking Humbly: The Holiness of the Poor, by St. John the Compassionate Mission.

Meet Kenneth, one of the treasures at the Mission. Taken from Walking Humbly: The Holiness of the Poor, by St. John the Compassionate Mission.