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Make a Difference talk – Noojimo’Iwewin Gitigaan/Healing Garden and Indigenous People’s Solidarity Group
September 25, 2022 @ 12:00 pm - 2:00 pm
Free
On the fourth Sunday of the month following the Sunday service, the folks from the Bloor Street United Church’s Social Justice Committee and from St. Matthew’s United Church present a guest speaker, and you’re invited! Speakers will be on Zoom link if you’d like to attend online, and projected into the sanctuary at 729 St. Clair Ave West, Toronto. Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/3616118730?pwd=MmY5THYwenhlS2JyaS8rS1ZmR0Mydz09
Alternatively, you can call 647-374-4685 or 647-558-0588, enter ID 361 611 8730, then press # #.
We expect speakers will be ready around 12:15pm. A time for questions and answers will follow. The event will be recorded and posted to our YouTube channel.
Upcoming Speakers:
Sunday, September 25th – Robin Buyers has just confirmed she will kick off our “Making a Difference” Speaker series after worship on Sunday Sept. 25 with a short history of the Noojimo’Iwewin Gitigaan/Healing Garden adjacent to St. Matt’s and how the Indigenous People’s Solidarity Group and community Garden Crew volunteers are modelling how even small urban spaces may become sites of reconnection with Creation and respect for Indigenous spirituality.
Robin Buyers is a Canadian Queer, white settler with hidden disabilities. Her roots are in the Ross Clan of Scottish highlands, Wales, and England. She has been active in Indigenous solidarity work in the Americas for more than 30 years, including as a Kairos Blanket Exercise facilitator, Co-Chair of the Americas Policy Group, frontline Community Peacemaker Teams Colombia and Turtle Island Solidarity worker, and Co-founder of Coalition for a Public Inquiry into Ipperwash. She retired as a Community Work Professor at George Brown College in 2016, and has since focused on neighbourhood and Land-based work with the Indigenous Peoples Solidarity Group (IPSG) and Noojimo’iwewin Gitigaan at St. Matthew’s United Church. She will speak about her evolution as an activist in the Indigenous justice movement, tell the story of the IPSG and Noojimo’iwewin Gitigaan, and share the vision of Noojimo’iwewin Gitigaan and the coast-to-coast-to coast National Healing Forest initiative of which it is a part. Participants will learn about settler responsibilities to honour the Treaties and move towards Right Relations with Indigenous Peoples, as well as how to engage with upcoming IPSG projects and events.
October 23rd – Save the date
November 27th – Save the date
You can view past videos on our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/bloorstreetunited
