Dear friends:

Our Anglican family works on many fronts to help people in need, through our food banks and lunch programs, our FaithWorks ministries, and countless other efforts. Yet the needs have grown, alarmingly so. Far too many people struggle to put food on the table for their families. In fact, about 380,000 people in Ontario must rely on food banks each month. That’s why I added my support to the Put Food in the Budget campaign for a $100 per month Healthy Food Supplement for people on social assistance.

Now I’ve decided to join prominent Ontarians in living on a food hamper diet for three days this Fall, as part of the “Do the Math Challenge” campaign. Other Bishops will be joining me, and I hope that many other Anglicans will also take part. We’ll be launching this event on October 4.

I’m not looking forward to subsisting on a plain, barebones diet for three days. But the fact is, I can choose to do this or not. That is not the case for thousands of people across Ontario. Throughout his life and witness, Jesus Christ made abundantly clear his sense of compassion and caring for those on the margins of society. We need to follow his example today, and the Do the Math Challenge is one way that we can be, however briefly, in the situation of people who are truly on the margins of our affluent society.

This is an act of solidarity with them, one that we feel will strengthen our advocacy with government. We hope to persuade government to do more to help the poorest members of our society through increases in social assistance rates. We are inviting Premier McGuinty and other MPPs to live on a food hamper diet with us. We will be following up with the government as it prepares the 2011 budget.

Our effort will not involve any food being diverted from foodbanks. I will be buying my own food for the three days involved, as will other Anglican participants, and I will continue to give a portion of my income to outreach efforts as part of my own stewardship.

I invite you to join me. Please consider it, and invite members of your parish to join us also. If you have any questions, please contact Murray MacAdam, our Social Justice and Advocacy Consultant, (mmacadam@toronto.anglican.ca, (416) 363-6021 ex.240) or view the information posted on our Social Justice and Advocacy webpage, www.toronto.anglican.ca/sjac.

Yours faithfully,
The Most Rev. Colin R. Johnson Archbishop of Toronto

For more information about this initiative see"Do the Math" webpage here »
Read more about this at The Anglican newspaper online here »
Download a pdf of the Archbishop's letter here »