Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Agriculture and Forestry
Issue 30 - Evidence - June 7, 2007
OTTAWA, Thursday, June 7, 2007
The Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry met this day at 9:04 a.m. to examine and report on rural poverty in Canada.
Senator Joyce Fairbairn (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: Good morning, honourable senators, and good morning to our witness. Welcome to those who have tuned in to watch the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry hearing on rural poverty.
Through our travels across the land, rural Canadians have repeatedly told us about the vital role played by religious communities in rural Canada. They not only help knit rural communities together through their teachings, but they are often front-line workers in the struggle to overcome rural poverty. It gives me great pleasure today to welcome the Reverend Christine O'Reilly, Minister of Knox Presbyterian Church in Thedford and Watford, two communities located in Lambton County, Ontario, a rural area near the southern shores of Lake Huron.
We have one hour to cover a wide array of issues with Reverend O'Reilly, so I would invite my colleagues to keep their questions as brief as possible to allow her to respond fully and for everyone to be able to contribute to the discussions.
Reverend Christine O'Reilly, Minister, Knox Presbyterian Church, Thedford and Watford, Ontario, as an individual: I want to thank you for the privilege of being here and for taking seriously the role that religious and faith-based communities play in rural Canada.
You are to be commended for exploring and understanding the issues and for providing helpful information and recommendations on this vast subject of poverty in rural Canada. Your work thus far has been insightful and interesting, and it is encouraging that you are taking the time to think about faith-based and church groups within rural Canada.
My purpose today is to speak to you, based on my experience and knowledge, about the role that rural churches have in identifying and addressing rural poverty among the people and communities they serve. Also, it is important to note how rural churches are affected by rural poverty and the consequences this has for rural communities.
Since 1988, I have been minister at two rural congregations in Southwestern Ontario. Knox Church in Thedford and St. Andrew's Church in Watford are each noted for having the tallest steeples in their communities, which can be seen from some distance. The church in Thedford was built in 1877 and the church at Watford in 1873. They have a long tradition of worship and of supporting the communities and the people in times of both celebration and sorrow. The biblically rich values of honesty and integrity, valour, compassion, kindness, self-sacrifice, stewardship of creation and love have been taught and practiced, a tradition that continues to this day.
Thedford is a small village with a population of about 800. We are about five minutes away from Ipperwash, which has been the subject of quite a bit of attention over recent years. The community draws members from the farms in the immediate area and also from the small communities within a 30-kilometre radius of the town.
In 1988, when I arrived in Thedford, worship attendance was about 20, and in recent years that has expanded to 60 to 80 on a Sunday, which is atypical for rural countries but I think is a result of both spiritual renewal and a renewed commitment from this congregation to serve its community.
The congregation has been instrumental in providing support and assistance to needy families through our church benevolent fund. Families with no connection to this congregation have sought and received assistance for everything from paying hydro bills to buying groceries and covering costs of transportation to medical appointments in London and Sarnia, the nearest urban centres. Travellers in distress have received aid.
During times of personal crises, this congregation has helped those who have lost a home or business due to fire, a large family who suffered the death of their mother during childbirth, and a family who faced the trauma of disclosed child sexual abuse and the subsequent incarceration of the primary wage earner. Funerals and the family gatherings that follow are offered without charge to families in financial distress. Without the support of this congregation and others in the community, these families would have struggled to a much greater degree, as social services are both a distance away and already stretched thin, both in personnel and finances.
Knox Church is very involved with our local elementary school, Bosanquet Central. Eight adults from our congregation serve as mentors to students identified as needing extra support in personal and social life skills; they meet for at least one hour a week. These adults form a friendship with students; they model and encourage positive self-esteem, foster a good work ethic and help students with their social and interpersonal skills. For most of these students, poverty is a reality in their lives, and their mentor provides a stable adult presence, which is often the only social support they receive.
Knox Church is also a key support for the snack program at our school. There are a significant number of students at our school who depend on the snack program for breakfast and/or lunch. Children are not in control of the quantity or availability of food at home and we have students who regularly arrive at school without food for lunch or not having had any breakfast. Other children come with foods that do not provide the nourishment needed for healthy growth and learning. Student behaviour is negatively impacted by hunger, which makes both learning and teaching difficult.
Since all our students are bussed to our school, having a full-time breakfast program is not possible, but working with the Canadian Living Foundation's Breakfast for Learning program and the Ontario Ministry of Health, we are able to purchase food supplies. However, that funding does not cover all of our expenses.
Through our church benevolent fund, we raise money to help purchase healthy foods such as cereal and milk, fresh fruits, some of which are donated by local farmers, and cheese and fruit juice delivered daily by student volunteers to each classroom. The food bank which operates in a church basement in Forest, Ontario, the town next to us, has been helpful in supplying us with cereal this past year.
The needs of students have been carried by our church members to other organizations and groups to which they belong. A local seniors' club has donated on a regular basis and several of our members started a weekly music jamboree program, which has raised nearly $1,000 over the school year to assist our snack program.
The other congregation I serve, St. Andrew's Watford, is a congregation of about 45 people on a Sunday morning and is directly east of London along Highway 402. This congregation takes an active role in the community of 1,000 with our local ministry and with inter-church events. St. Andrews contributes to a ministerial emergency fund that assists families and individuals in need. The congregation has helped families apart from this fund who have come with particular short-term requests for assistance. Assistance to a county-wide Christmas program and a food bank in the city of Sarnia is often regularly given.
Leaders from this church also offer a weekly afterschool program for children at no cost, which offers a snack and teaches faith-based values that help shape future citizens to contribute to their community and beyond. We also have offered meeting space free of charge for a local committee establishing a new medical centre for the township and attracting doctors to establish a practice in the village.
The changes I see in the population in each of the communities I work with present particular challenges and opportunities, both for congregations and clergy.
As the size of farms increase, there are empty farmhouses in the community. Farmers often rent these houses to supplement their income. Small towns such as Bedford and Watford have homes for sale or rent at substantially lower prices than seen in cities.
Renters often arrive from larger centres such as Sarnia or London, attracted by the lower housing costs. However, in my experience, these are people who already face poverty within their own families, and they come to communities that are burdened by their own poverty issues. The needs these families or individuals present are often unavailable or barely accessible, such as long-term mental health care, behaviour support for students at schools, steady work opportunities and free or low-cost recreational facilities and programs.
The role played by rural congregations is part of the fabric of community life. Church buildings offer space for meetings, shelter in crisis and places to mark the transition of life. Church members live out their beliefs by providing much-needed assistance to rural communities.
In a CBC Radio interview conducted by Sheila Rogers, the topic of volunteerism in Canada was under discussion, and I noted with interest a comment that approximately 75 per cent of volunteers come through churches and faith groups. The values that inspire and motivate volunteers to better their communities and care for others are proclaimed in and through faith.
When I consider the members of my congregations, I know individuals who give of themselves and their time in many ways. Some take on many causes, others one or two. In each of the congregations, members live out their faith as volunteer cancer patient drivers, shut-in and retirement home visitors, Meals on Wheels drivers, caring quilters groups, afterschool children's program leaders, school council representatives, volunteer firefighters, leaders of events that assist children with autism, friendship visits with lonely seniors still in their own homes, volunteer workers with victims' services, leaders of cancer fundraising events, coaches for hockey and soccer teams, volunteers with Communities in Bloom and take on keeping a stretch of public road clean and litter-free. Churches often band together to offer a vacation program for children in communities where recreational programs are few and far between or are purely sports oriented, which involves both expense and athletic interest and aptitude.
I agree with the Senate committee's assertion that rural communities must be in the forefront of devising ways to address rural poverty but would ask that senators and other agencies take careful note that many rural people are already carrying a heavy load of responsibility and a host of volunteer organizations.
Rural clergy too are often heavily involved with the needs of their communities and congregations. As social services are centralized in cities or larger towns with cutbacks in staff and budget, clergy are often sought out as first responders or long-term supports. Most ministers and priests do not receive adequate education, counselling and social service work, yet are often placed in positions where serious help is required and no one else is readily available. Rural clergy often face long drives to offer spiritual care for parishioners and others in hospital, long-term care and correction facilities. Distance from centres of education and reduced finances make ongoing learning challenging at times. Rural clergy usually do not have a ministry staff to assist with the work and thus carry heavy loads themselves. In addition, rural churches are usually seen as first-call places with lower stipends and little prestige. Many rural churches thus tend to have a series of newly ordained short-term ministers who face situations for which they are professionally, personally and spiritually unprepared.
Any plan to address rural poverty in practical ways needs to acknowledge the extraordinary contribution both lay and ordained people make. Any plan must ensure that the implementation of additional programs does not increase their load of responsibilities.
Hometown leaders need support, encouragement and assistance to be part of the answer to rural poverty. They need to be included in decisions, programs, and implementation strategies since they have both intimate knowledge of local concerns and the trust of local residents.
Rural churches are themselves affected by the rural poverty they seek to address. Rural depopulation takes its toll on membership, forcing churches to close or amalgamate. This weakens the ability of the church to serve in the community and creates gaps where social services do not or cannot fill in.
The values of faith that shape both individuals and communities erode, leaving a culture impoverished by visible and personal expressions, the virtues upon which our country was built.
With my involvement in schools, I am keenly aware that the values students bring to school often foster disrespect for others, violence, racism, harassment and selfishness. Most of our students do not come from faith-based homes. Attitudes and opinions are often gleaned from the television, video and computer games, where the values that make a school and a society pleasant and prosperous are not regularly reflected or championed. As one staff member reported to me, the church's involvement with their school helps their students see there is a bigger world out there and instils values such as compassion for others.
Knox Church was instrumental in getting students involved with a fundraising and learning event for work in Southern Sudan and in the church mission team that travelled to Mississippi for post-Katrina aid. Students were able to meet those who worked in both Sudan and Mississippi and see how their help had a positive impact on others. Many of these children will never have the chance to travel far or meet people from other places. Without the church's presence and involvement, these opportunities would not have been available to those students.
In the community of Watford, churches are facing troubled times, along with residences, businesses and other institutions. Due to population aging and decline, this community lost its high school and has seen two elementary schools amalgamated. Despite many meetings and much research and support by local leaders, the school board's decision was a fait accompli. Residents felt betrayed. Through this tense situation, clergy met with school principals regularly to offer support and assistance and were present at community meetings. In the aftermath of the decision, churches and clergy worked hard to foster healing and hope in the transition.
Watford faces an even more difficult issue now, which will have long-term effects on the viability of the community. This spring, the provincial government approved what will be the largest landfill in the province, and quite possibly the country, to be located at the very edge of this village. The community has battled this landfill site for more than a decade but to no avail. It is more politically expedient to anger 1,000 voters in Watford than 1 million or more in the Brampton area. Over 600 acres of farmland is now on its way to becoming a garbage dump.
Every six minutes, day and night, a 50-foot garbage truck will travel to that site and unload. Concerns about the affects of toxic fumes and materials that enter the air and water table seem to fall on deaf ears. The future of the community is in jeopardy.
The small businesses that have been mainstays in the community have disappeared. Property values are decreasing. How can the community advertise itself as a great place to live and work when the garbage dump will eventually cast a huge shadow over the cemetery and tower above the 80 foot high church steeple? Eventually the garbage dump will be as high as the span of the Blue Water Bridge, which links Sarnia to Port Huron.
We would be better off with a business that employed 150 people than a dump employing 15 people. An atmosphere of weariness prevails when fighting a major corporation and the provincial government. There is a loss of community control, a deep sense of not being heard or respected and anger that land once valued for food production is now being used to store waste. Concerns about financial poverty are growing but another kind of poverty abounds; a poverty of hope, respect, pride in one's hometown, the value of the land and the task of stewardship. There is anger at the process. There is disgust that while most residents of the areas are on a recycling program and user-pay garbage system, the Greater Toronto Area, which produces the most of the incoming waste, still refuses to implement even a modest garbage reduction program.
The churches in Watford are struggling both financially and with declining membership. The future does not look promising and within the next 10 to 15 years there will be one Protestant church in town where now there are four. The local Catholic church is facing its own challenges with sister parishes closing and priests stretched further between congregations. This is not only a result of rural poverty but it will create a poverty of spirit, social services and expression of values that make a community strong and positive. Watford's story is not unique. Churches in Thedford face similar issues as do rural churches across Canada. Rural congregations and clergy face great problems but there are also opportunities to be seized to make a difference for good in the name of a loving God for rural people and rural communities. The strength of spirit that characterizes rural congregations humbles and inspires me. They also embolden me to say that we must not, as institutions of church and state, abandon, dismiss or diminish the rural people and communities that are part of this country. They have much to offer Canada. They also offer Canada an opportunity to learn, respect and support rural people and places. Without our rural churches, without the values they express and beliefs they live out, Canada will be an impoverished place.
The Chairman: This is the first time we have heard this kind of presentation. It was very brave and moving and thank you for being here today.
Senator Gustafson: You have brought a challenging report of the experience of much of rural Canada. I commend you for your work in fulfilling the commandments of our Lord: If they are hungry feed them and if they are strangers, take them in. In Canada we take much for granted. I commend you on a very excellent presentation. A country like Canada should not need food banks. Would you expand on food banks and the numbers of people who are using them?
Rev. O'Reilly: Our church in Thedford and other churches in smaller communities support Contact House Food Bank in Forest. I do not have specific numbers, but from our involvement, I know that the numbers are increasing, serving both the Aboriginal population as well as the rural poor in our communities. Having taken supplies to the Anglican Church in Forest, I saw that it has taken over the entire church basement. It is not much smaller than the room we are sitting in now. The shelves are full. I saw eight or 10 carloads of people waiting to get their weekly supplies.
Senator Gustafson: Is some of this poverty due to alcohol abuse?
Rev. O'Reilly: Yes, some of the poverty is due to alcohol abuse and other issues. There are a number of single parent homes. We know farm income is drastically dropping off in our communities. Some of our small businesses are finding it difficult to maintain their presence. Big box stores in Sarnia, London and Strathroy make it hard for our local retailers to compete. The small businesses and their jobs go also. This leaves people with far fewer employment opportunities. There are seasonal employment opportunities related to camps and trailer parks on nearby Lake Huron, but they are typically minimum wage jobs, making it difficult to support a family.
I see poverty the most through our work at school. I know of children who arrive at school with nothing but Jell-O in a baggy. Without the snack bins we deliver to each class, those children would not have enough to eat all day. This makes learning and basic health difficult. Children do not have buying power or a say in the quantity and quality of food brought into the house. We see children who do not have opportunities for things like music lessons.
Thedford and Watford are big hockey towns. That is an expensive sport beyond the reach of many families. Youths hang around the streets, watch TV or play video games. I doubt that fosters good health, values or work ethic.
Senator Gustafson: There is no quick answer to solving this. If you could do one thing as government, what would you do?
Rev. O'Reilly: That is a huge question. I realize it is the question you are addressing.
Senator Gustafson: We are going to be faced with this. We have heard so much that it is almost impossible to do justice to it. There is no point in going through this exercise unless something can be done.
Rev. O'Reilly: If government can do anything, just even in terms of raising the level of respect that is afforded to rural people in rural communities so that there concerns are addressed. I recognize the number of votes are dwarfed by the large urban areas.
If rural people feel that they are heard and that they make a difference, it would go a long way to fostering a sense of energy, respect and encouragement. Rural people are incredibly resourceful; they are survivors. They would not be there if they were not. It does get wearing when, time after time, you feel like your voice is not being heard and the things that are important to you get lost in the clamour for more votes or what seems to be politically or financially expedient.
There are things like quality of life that you cannot put a price tag on, but those are things that all Canadians seek from coast to coast, regardless of where they live. If there is anything we can do to encourage respect and an atmosphere of taking rural people, their communities and their concerns, seriously it would be helpful.
Certainly supporting people who are already, as I said, doing a lot of volunteer work is important. Peter Bush has been instrumental in his community of Mitchell in getting funds to help fund a youth centre and so on. Sometimes the paperwork and all the red tape of accessing those things and being aware of them can be overwhelming. For an individual who is already carrying a heavy workload, trying to raise a family and doing volunteer work, sitting down and wading through all that paperwork can seem like an insurmountable task.
I know the government has made decisions in recent years to relocate things like passport offices and Revenue Canada and so on to places that are outside of some of the major central cities in Canada. Offering those kinds of opportunities to even smaller places so that there are solid work opportunities for people is important. Most people want to work and support their families; they do not want to be on unemployment; they do not want to be taking government handouts or lining up at the food bank or calling me on the phone and saying, ``I cannot pay my hydro bill this month. Can you help me out?''
Offering solid work opportunities to smaller places across the country, I think, would be key and anything we can do to help our agricultural commodities would be a huge thing.
In relation to our schools, while I recognize that education is a provincial matter, the cutbacks that we have seen in our schools bring great sorrow to my heart. We no longer offer even a music program in most of our schools in Ontario. The arts programs have been cut back so that it is left to the classroom teacher to try to put together some kind of music program. Not all classroom teachers are musically gifted or have the appropriate teaching, but we no longer have the music teachers that travel from school to school.
Also for sports equipment, I am on our local school council, and for us to put up a new basketball hoop for our younger students was going to run into several thousands dollars. Our school council does not have several thousand dollars for one basketball hoop. You can only go to the community so many times to ask for support for those kinds of things.
As I mentioned, everything from children's aid societies are stretched to the limit, and in my experience, they are located in the cities. The issues that face children's aid involvement in the small, rural towns do not receive the same kind attention that they would if they were located in the city. The workers are stretched and are few and far between. Ongoing counselling, support and mental health care are not readily available and schools are left to try to handle behavioural problems that are beyond their capacity. We have a reduction in the number of behavioural support workers or educational assistants that are available for classrooms. We have students that come with tremendous baggage and find it difficult to function in a school setting, yet the staff is not available to provide support. Again, that is where some of our mentors and someone who is involved — like me — can come in, but there is a limit to what we can do. I cannot be at the school all the time; I have other responsibilities.
I wonder about some of those students in the future. If for no other reason, ethically it is important but also financially responsible to intervene as early as we can into the lives of children. Every dollar invested in a child is a dollar saved for those who grow up to be adults and end up in trouble with the law or do not have the work or social skills to function well in life.
Senator Callbeck: I want to congratulate you and your congregations on the services that you provide. What you are doing is truly remarkable.
You mentioned that when you went to Thedford there were 20 people in your congregation, and now you congregation has increased to 60 to 80 people. Has your other congregation increased as well?
Rev. O'Reilly: No, there has been a decrease in worship attendance there.
Senator Callbeck: Have people moved away from there?
Rev. O'Reilly: There is some of that with our younger people. When I first went to the Watford congregation we had four generations in church on a Sunday, which is unheard of in many places. Those people die. We have had a lot of funerals in my tenure in Watford. The people who were the foundation, the pillars of the church, have gone to their eternal reward, as we all will. Unfortunately, their grandchildren and their great grandchildren — and this is a story I am sure you have heard in every rural community have you visited — cannot all come back to farm or work in a small business in town because the opportunity is not there. They grow up, go to school, get their education and they move away. Some of them are here in Ottawa; some are in Toronto, or London or other places in Ontario or in other provinces because that is where they have found work opportunities. In our congregation, we have several families that have three, four, six children, and maybe one child out of each of those families will remain in the Watford community; the rest will leave.
Senator Callbeck: You must have many wonderful volunteers and great leadership. What percentage of your congregations are volunteers?
Rev. O'Reilly: I would say easily two-thirds of my congregation is involved in some type of volunteer work.
Senator Callbeck: What is the average age of your volunteers?
Rev. O'Reilly: The age varies, particularly in the Thedford congregation we are fortunate to have a number of healthy younger seniors; that is, younger retirees who have moved to the area because of the beauty of Lake Huron, and so on. They are instrumental, especially with our mentor program. All of these people, except for me, are young, healthy retired people who volunteer their time at the school. Obviously, those people who work during the day are unable to volunteer at the school.
The age of volunteers is certainly older; 50-plus anyway. That is a values thing, too. You grow up with the idea that helping your fellow brothers and sisters in the community is simply something you do.
The Government of Ontario has instituted as a requirement for graduation from high school that students must do 40 hours of community service. That is a positive step, but I am not sure that that is enough to ensure a lifelong commitment to volunteerism.
Senator Callbeck: You mentioned the mentor program, which is wonderful.
We have heard in our travels that many volunteer are burning out. I imagine that you are having that problem. Is it difficult to get volunteers? Are their numbers increasing or decreasing?
Rev. O'Reilly: I am thankful that our numbers have remained steady. One reason for that is that we take time and make an effort to acknowledge, thank and support our volunteers. As a minister, I am more concerned that my congregation is living out what they believe and making a difference in the community than that we have a meeting going on every night at church. We do things to express appreciation. Both the volunteer program and the SNAP program are part of the fabric and life in the church, so they receive support. From time to time, people want to take a break, or, as they get older and find it more difficult to deal with the energetic youngsters in the public school, they sometimes move on to volunteer at the retirement home or something like that. They are generally not giving up volunteering but move on to something that suits their energy level at that time.
Senator Callbeck: Do the other churches in the area offer the same kind of services?
Rev. O'Reilly: Some do and some do not. Some do not because they are facing a crisis of financial viability or sometimes of leadership. Sometimes, as congregations get smaller, it is more difficult for them to shoulder the load to keep their own church going let alone doing all of these community things.
As I said, part of the difficulty is also with rural clergy. The average stay for a minister in a rural church is three to five years. Theological research shows that you do not even begin to do your best ministry until you have been in a rural community for five to seven years, because it takes that long to get to know the people and the place and to gain their trust and respect. When you are dealing with families that are living on century farms and you are there for three years, why should they trust in you if they know that you will soon be gone? The sense of commitment to the community, when rural clergy are able to stay and are committed to stay — as long as it is a healthy ministry — goes a long way to encouraging growth and encouraging people to be committed to their church and their community.
Senator St. Germain: I thank you for being here today, Reverend.
When Senator Gustafson asked you what the government could do, you mentioned respect for rural people and then you spoke about the system of volunteerism. Do you see government supporting volunteerism financially or through recognition?
Rev. O'Reilly: I see the government doing both. Most volunteers do not want to be paid for what they do. They consider their work as part of their service to their community. However, it is difficult for programs to continue or to expand to reach the community's needs. There is only one pie of dollars in the community, and in any community at any given time there can be school fundraising, hockey fundraising and figure skating fundraising. As well, there is always something coming home from the school raising money for a trip or for something that needs to be purchased, and we would also like them to continue to support their church. You can get donor fatigue after a while.
I am not talking about financial support for the individuals doing the volunteering but financial support for the organizations so that they may continue their work without having to do so much fundraising. I recognize that there must be checks and balances to ensure that funds are distributed responsibly, but if it were possible to access money without having to fill out miles of paperwork, that would go a long way toward helping those organizations get the funding they need.
It is important to recognize the work and dedication of volunteers. We need to do everything we can to recognize and thank people who are giving of their time and not just throwing a toonie or a five-dollar bill into a basket. It costs much more for people to give of their time, energy and skills. Anything we can do to encourage, enhance, recognize and pay tribute to our volunteers is time, effort and money well spent.
Senator Mahovlich: Thank you for appearing today, Reverend O'Reilly.
I come from the small community of Schumacher where our minister was Father Les Costello. He did a great deal for that community. He grew up in Schumacher, left, and came back as a priest. He was a professional hockey player who in 1949 won the Stanley Cup with the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Rev. O'Reilly: That is long before my time.
Senator Mahovlich: Yes, it is long before my time, too.
Father Costello organized many things to help the poor and did a lot of work. He passed away, and now the church is going to close. The elderly ladies of that town are disappointed because they will now have to go to Timmins to attend church.
I see that Lambton Shores is the nearest town.
Rev. O'Reilly: Lambton Shores is the result of the amalgamation by the provincial government. Thedford is part of Lambton Shores, as is Port Franks; it is like a township. On the Statistics Canada website it says, ``Thedford Village dissolved,'' because it is part of the Lambton Shores, but to the people who live there call it Thedford, Forest and Arkona.
Senator Mahovlich: It is the same with Schumacher.
With a population of 11,000 people, are there many Lions Clubs in that community?
Rev. O'Reilly: There are a couple of Lions Clubs as well as the Optimist Club in a couple of communities.
Senator Mahovlich: Do they sponsor hockey teams?
Rev. O'Reilly: Yes, they do the best they can to sponsor hockey. Individual businesses also sponsor hockey teams.
Senator Mahovlich: Do buses run from one little town to another?
Rev. O'Reilly: It is generally up to parents to transport their children to hockey.
Senator Mahovlich: There is no public transportation for youngsters to travel from arena to arena?
Rev. O'Reilly: No, parents are responsible to transport their children.
Senator Mahovlich: Perhaps the government could do something in that area.
Rev. O'Reilly: Minor hockey in Lambton Shores is now amalgamated as well, because there are not enough players to have teams in all the little places. It will all operate out of Forest now.
Senator Mahovlich: You mentioned job creation. Do you have any ideas as to what the government could do in that area?
Rev. O'Reilly: Even some government agencies have moved to other places, including the passport office.
Senator Mahovlich: Citizenship and Immigration moved to Alberta. I found that strange, because people think of Ottawa when they think of immigration.
Rev. O'Reilly: Yes, but in an electronic age, much of it is done online.
Senator Mahovlich: You still have to make sense of everything.
Rev. O'Reilly: Yes, we could have government departments in our area. We could use seed money for people who want to start their own small business. It is difficult for small businesses to compete again the big box discount stores. We still have many farmers who sell produce right at the farm gate, but that is seasonal work. There is still a sense that most people in the small communities would like, as much as possible, to support their own community but there are some financial realities that they have to face. If buying groceries in a small town will cost you one-third or more of what it will cost if you take a drive to other places, especially if you are trying to feed a family, the local person will drive the distance to save money. Eventually, the local store has to close.
Senator Mahovlich: Location means quite a bit for businesses. Being near Port Huron would an ideal place for Lambton Shores.
Rev. O'Reilly: Yes, it certainly pulls in a lot of tourism. Of course, right now with the Canadian dollar being so strong against the American dollar, even on the Memorial Day weekend the local parks reported that they were not as full as they have been in other years because there is not a financial advantage for Americans to come over.
Senator Mahovlich: You have to make incentives.
Rev. O'Reilly: Exactly, and it will be more difficult as the new passport security regulations come into play for people travelling back and forth across the Blue Water Bridge, and so on.
Senator Gustafson: I do not know if I should raise this, but I will. It has been politically correct to support separation of church and state. That is, do not let the church have anything to do with what is going on with government, and so on. There are those who are looking at that and saying, ``Maybe we went too far.''
Rev. O'Reilly: For one thing, the notion of separation of church and state was an American tradition, not particularly Canadian, although it seems it is becoming more prevalent in Canadian society.
The separation of church and state had more to do with the fact that the church should not be under the control of the state and vice versa. It does not mean that the two cannot work together. It is quite possible for faith communities, Christian and otherwise, to work together with the state when it comes to the well-being of people in the communities. It is not necessary that every opportunity that a church has is necessarily one of proselytizing; it does not mean that the state is endorsing any particular religious viewpoint but looking at the bigger picture of the health and well-being of its citizens and its constituents. For example, there is the work that we do with the schools in both of my congregations. Our mentors are not going into the schools trying to tell the children that they need to follow a certain religious ideology. They are going there to foster positive values around honesty, integrity, work ethic, compassion and self- sacrifice — the things that this country was built on and continues to espouse.
Senator Gustafson: At the same time, 75 per cent or more of the work that is done among the peoples of the world in poverty are done by faith work.
Rev. O'Reilly: Definitely, and that is the case because of the motivation, the ethic and the way of life. This is what one does and how one lives one's life.
Senator Gustafson: That is true. It seems that when government gets involved in many of these areas, things do not seem to work too well. For instance, the Canadian Foodgrains Bank was established by the Mennonite churches after their near starvation in 1925. That wonderful organization continues to feed people around the world. I can recall that in Lampman they called for two carloads of wheat. A carload of wheat is about 3,000 bushels. They received 12 carloads of wheat. One of the immigrant people from Germany who came with a small truckload of wheat said, ``We lived on rutabagas for a year while we were in Germany. That was all we had to eat. I will gladly give a truckload of wheat to help.'' Such organizations have had a place in society, while at the same time, in evaluating the whole thing, they tell me that in Greater Vancouver less than 5 per cent of the people attend any kind of church. Maybe we have lost something along the way.
Rev. O'Reilly: I certainly think that for the people who are volunteering for causes that are not necessarily the glitzy ones — driving someone for cancer treatments once a week is not exactly a glamorous thing to do — it is about compassion and concern for your neighbour.
One of the things that small communities and rural areas offer is that people still know each other. People still have a sense of who their neighbour is and what matters.
Small towns may not have all of the health care and the social services. My mother-in-law and my parents moved to where I live. The fact that they were visited regularly and people cared about what happened to them and so forth, even though they were not from there, is a testimony to the way that people reach out to each other and still know and care about what happens to their neighbours.
I grew up in the in the west end of Toronto and you did not always know your neighbours. You did not know who they were, where they worked and what they did. In small towns and rural communities, that is still predominantly true. When you have a name and a face that you know, people are committed to caring. People notice if the neighbour's light has not been on at the regular time and will investigate to see if there is a need for help. If an ambulance or a police car has been at that place, people will know, and someone will call and find out if everything is all right. It is just those small, kinds of neighbourly things that sometimes get lost along the way.
As I said, I am proud of the work that not only my own congregations but also having visited and worked with rural congregations from the east to the west, that the same spirit prevails. People care passionately about each other, their community and trying to make a difference for good. Anything that we can do to enhance, support and respect that will go a long way to continuing to have the kind of Canada that we want.
Senator Peterson: Thank you, Rev. O'Reilly, for your moving and concise presentation. In all the good work that you do with your volunteers and other volunteer groups in your areas, what percentage of the needs do you think you are meeting?
Rev. O'Reilly: We are meeting less than one-half of the need. I could easily find students for three times the number of mentors I have working in the school. It would not be a problem. In terms of the kind of visitation and awareness and other things we would like, I would love for us to be able to offer a divorce care program for some of our single parent families to give them the kind of support they need. Again, time becomes an issue. With all the work those two churches are involved in, we are not meeting half the needs of our community. I would think most churches would say the same thing.
Senator Peterson: There is also urban poverty, as you are aware.
Rev. O'Reilly: Of course.
Senator Peterson: However, on rural poverty, there is the additional hurdle of transportation, not only for sport and children but also for health care for the elderly. Have you given any thought to how that can be addressed? It is a big issue. We hear it about the lack of transportation all the time.
Rev. O'Reilly: Yes, there could be some kind of government subsidy to help with travel costs. I am not sure that starting up a bus service will be helpful because the needs are so individual around the times that people need to be in a certain hospital, but there could be subsidy available for the volunteer driver. There could be a subsidy for those families who are shouldering the burden of care and taking time off work to care for an elderly parent, sibling, or child who is chronically or critically ill.
Senator Peterson: It would not be unreasonable for the government to possibly give a tax break to those people so they are at least not out-of-pocket?
Rev. O'Reilly: Exactly, and especially with rising fuel costs, which is a huge issue for families. I am working with one family who is involved with legal proceedings. They have to travel to Sarnia and each time transportation costs create another financial hardship or stress for that family.
Senator Peterson: Dealing with this poverty issue on a bigger scale, what do you think of a guaranteed annual income where all Canadians would share in the burden of rural poverty?
Rev. O'Reilly: That is a worthy concept that needs further evaluation. I recognize that there are at times issues of abuse and lack of work ethic that are just part of society. Some people, for mental, physical or emotional reasons, will never be able to hold down the full-time job to which most Canadians aspire. As part of a caring and compassionate society, we do need to care for those people. I do not have a problem with encouraging people to work. I do not think it is healthy for a society to continue to hand out support for people who are able to do something, but I think that the work has to be meaningful and not just menial. That presents a challenge of its own. Certainly, some kind of guaranteed income would go a long way to helping people provide for themselves and their families, but I recognize that it is a multi-layered issue.
Senator St. Germain: Reverend, like Senator Mahovlich, I grew up in a very small community. I attended a Grade 1 to Grade 8 one-room schoolhouse. In 1949, I was already 12 years old, and there was a lot of concern in the community then. If someone got hurt or died, it was traumatic. How do we deal with this secularized society that has really lost respect in many cases, especially in the urban areas, but infiltrating into the rural areas? You have moral decay and violence. It is an ``all about me'' society, materialistic and needful of instant gratification. These are things you are dealing with. How do you think the church is dealing with this? I attend church every week, but I do not see us really addressing this aspect of society that will lead to greater challenges for those who are poverty stricken in our rural communities. This just exacerbates the situation. How do you deal with that? I am sure you must think about it. You live with it pretty well in your profession.
Rev. O'Reilly: Very much so. I have two comments. First, as I said in the presentation, rural clergy need to have the support, the encouragement and the ability to continue to learn and to stay longer in their communities. That becomes almost a cultural thing too. We live in the ``bigger is better'' kind of culture, so moving up to the bigger church is seen as advancement and so on. I certainly fight against that, having been in rural ministry all of my ministry years, actually, as a choice. Those people are able to become part of the community, in effect, akin to the priest that Senator Mahovlich referred to. There is a sense that people like that can offer a sense of the values that are good and right and true and a sense of compassion and kindness. They model that in the way they live, which provides inspiration to fellow residents in their community. I think churches need to be bold to address these issues and talk about them out loud and to encourage people to live out what they believe. It is critical for the church not to sequester itself away in its own bubble where we just talk about these things in a holy huddle on Sunday mornings. These things need to be the framework of our lives, and we model that by involvement in our communities and involvement with people who may never darken the door of the church. The integrity has to be there so that you live out what you believe. It is not enough for churches to stand up and say, ``We are against this,'' and, ``We are against that.'' I think churches need to stand up and say, ``This is what we are for. This is what we believe to be true, and it is evidenced in how our people live their lives and in the ways that they give of themselves to their communities.'' That goes a lot farther than any pronouncements or banging of fists on pulpits in a negative sense. There is a lot that we are for, and sometimes that gets lost by strident voices talking about what we are against.
Senator Mahovlich: A friend of mine has just retired. He lives in the fairly good sized community in Bracebridge. He has called the Red Cross, and he is doing a lot of charity, driving people to Toronto for hospital visits. Does Lambton Shores have a Red Cross organization?
Rev. O'Reilly: No.
Senator Mahovlich: Are there any other organizations like the Red Cross that help out?
Rev. O'Reilly: The VON, Victorian Order of Nurses, is involved in our community, and they seek volunteers. We have Cancer Society volunteers who canvass and do the driving and so on. We have victim services, who work with people who are victims of crime or have suffered a tragic loss. We have volunteers who work with those organizations. It is interesting that hardly a month goes by without my getting a letter from one of those organizations, saying, ``Can you advertise that we need volunteers?'' The organizations themselves know that churches are probably one of the best places to find volunteers.
Senator Mahovlich: That is interesting. I know my friend is busy three days a weeks.
Rev. O'Reilly: Most of the retired people I know do not know how they had time to work because they are busy doing those things and gladly doing them.
The Chairman: Thank you very much for coming. This has been a very important presentation. We are looking very vigorously at rural poverty out on the land. We have been in every province in the eastern part of Canada, the Atlantic Provinces, in every province in the West and back and forth with visits in Ontario and Quebec. Not that we did not know, but we have been focusing on one thing and all of a sudden this other large picture comes before us. If we are faltering on the land, in agriculture and the farm community, then what happens to the small communities that are really very much the root of our rural Canada? If the farm community goes down, what happens to those towns? In parts of Canada, we have seen what happens to them.
The things you have been talking about today are interesting. The degree to which a variety of different religious organizations have been enormously helpful and very much at the heart of keeping many of our smaller rural structures together is extremely important.
I come from Southwestern Alberta, from the southwest corner, and we, at many times far back in our history, had large groups of people coming up over the border from the State of Utah; the Mormon pioneers. The towns that grew up then are still strong today. No matter what happens, the core is still there and no one is taken for granted; people who are in trouble will automatically have a place to go and someone to care for them.
The kind of work you do, and it must be extremely frustrating because of the lack of outside contribution, is incredibly important and I want to thank you for coming here and being so open and forthright about your own frustrations and how you respond when you see difficulties and sadness in your community.
It is very important that we have been able to hear your testimony and I certainly hope that people are watching this telecast. We wish you well.
Rev. O'Reilly: Thank you very much.
The committee continued in camera.