Seeing for themselves: urban plunges take NYCers to the streets

To compare the 2004 edition of the MB National Youth Conference to its predecessors would be like comparing apples to baseballs: similar shape, but by no means interchangeable.

Traditionally, NYC took place in the ski haven of Banff (or in nearby Calgary in 2001), where youth groups could hit the slopes if they so chose. By locating in inner city Toronto, the organizers shook up the setting but they also shook up youth. The NYC slogan of “4 Real” couldn’t have been more appropriate.

Central to this focus on the real world were half-day urban mission tracks available in lieu of workshops. Run by Youth Mission International (YMI), these tracks were designed to give students a glimpse of the desperate need of inner city neighbourhoods in general and Toronto in specific.

Youth groups could choose from five tracks:

• the Street Plunge – learning about the city and serving it through conversation, prayer and PAX or Public Acts of Christ (a.k.a random acts of kindness);
• the Street Youth Simulation – exploring the city through the eyes of a runaway teen new to the city;
• the Cross-Cultural plunge – immersion in the various ethnic districts of Toronto;
• the Market Plunge – exploring the “market culture” of Old Town and St. Lawrence Market while offering help to its workers, often immigrants;
• the Urban Mission Adventure.

Opened eyes

The largest and most intense track was Urban Mission Adventure (UMA). It spanned two half-days and included guest speakers from the streets, PAX, visits to the World Vision Refugee Centre as well as a YWCA shelter and the Scott Street Mission, and more.

Planner Michelle Demers, a YMI intern, said she wanted to open kids’ minds to new ideas. “We really wanted God to move them and open their eyes to realities and different lifestyles,” she said. “To [see] the truth behind different social issues such as homelessness and prostitution.”

Impacting the city was also a priority. “We had [hundreds of] people here,” she said, “and Christmas is a very tricky time. It was my prayer that the city would be changed by our presence.” Demers and the YMI team partnered with local churches and missions to make sure they were impacting the community in a positive way without crushing it with the weight of good intentions.

Steve Martin is a biker who stands about 6’5”, has a big beard and long hair, and could stare a hole through a wall if he wanted to. He’s also the street pastor at Sanctuary, a street church at Charles and Yonge in the downtown core. A former military man, Martin has been working on the streets of Toronto for 15 years and estimates he has lost 80 friends to the streets, whether by age, disease or murder.

Martin is utterly convinced of the importance of bringing youth to see for themselves the horrors of the streets. For one thing, it brings that horror closer to home. Although people think street people are just Torontonians, “they’re coming from somewhere else,” he said. “Today, when one of the girls upstairs was talking about where she’s from, there were people there who know the same church she was talking about, know the same neighbourhood she was talking about.”

Some urban plunge participants on the streets of Toronto

Imagining a runaway

The half-day mission tracks gave groups a precise glimpse of one specific aspect of city life. I was fortunate to be paired with Steve Martin in co-ordinating the Street Youth Simulation, where kids were given $1.50 and told to visit, on foot, the various street areas of Toronto. These included the gay district, male and female prostitution areas, and street sleeping areas.

Youth were instructed to imagine themselves as a 15-year-old runaway with no ID, from an abusive background, who has come to live on the streets in Toronto. They were to fill out a questionnaire detailing where and how they would sleep, eat, make money, entertain themselves, go to the bathroom, etc. After four hours they would regroup to debrief.

While some participants showed up at Sanctuary two hours early with blank papers, the debrief struck a chord with many. Asked where they would choose to spend the night, youth had picked places like grates, malls, grass or bridges. They were shocked when Martin revealed that most of them wouldn’t sleep for the first few nights, since that’s when predators come out.

Plus, sleeping on someone else’s grate could have dire consequences. If a real runaway answered even one of the questions wrong, he said, they would die. The youth were told that 86% of girls enter into prostitution after two weeks on the streets; after guessing 40–50%, they were more shocked to learn that 83% of boys would sell themselves after two weeks.

These statistics visibly affected the group, moving some to tears. Martin stresses that they were not meant for shock value only, but in order to keep kids off the streets and, what’s more, encourage their friends to stay off the streets as well.

NYC’04 participants serving at a food bank in Toronto

Amazing stories

Participants also came away from the UMA and the mission tracks with stories of amazing openness and compassion, something they weren’t sure existed on the streets.

“We found this lady who works at a mustard place. I asked if I could help her and I spent the whole time there just putting labels on jars and helping her sell mustard,” said Elisa Short of Topeka (Kan.) MB Church. “One of the cool things she said was ‘you can do this because God loves you, and you’re helping me because I know that God loves me’.”

“There are a lot of different people who are differently receptive to help,” said Nick Janzen of Winkler (Man.) MB Church. “With some people, you brighten their day when you give them something. But I also sat down beside an atheist professor and asked him if he wanted to see the Father’s Love Letter [a collection of Bible verses youth were given to distribute]. He said he doesn’t believe in delusions. That’s the first time I’ve been called delusional for what I believe.”

With the location of NYC ’07 still undecided, it’s impossible to know whether mission tracks will be part of the conference. Hopefully they will be. The urban mission adventure is an experience like no other.

Kerry O’Brien has been a volunteer and participant with YMI since the summer of 2002. He attends Waterloo (Ont.) MB Church.