…and caring heart who dares to feed any hungry person in Jubilee Park as a Pastor and members of his congregation learned.

The Pastor was ordered to City Hall, in the manner of a naughty child to the principal’s office, when the usual Abbotsford Police tactics of physical intimidation, verbal harassment, placing visitors to Jubilee Park under surveillance and following people to their homes failed to stop the Pastor and his congregation sharing Cheerios with the hungry and destitute in Jubilee Park early Thursday mornings.

Councillors Smith, Beck and Harris, a plethora of city staff and several witnesses for the persecution were on hand to bully the good Pastor into obedience. The attempt to overwhelm was denied the city when members of the Pastor’s congregation, members of Christian leadership and several individuals experienced and knowledgeable on addiction and homelessness attended in support of the Pastor and his good works.

The councillors expanded their attempt to browbeat the Pastor into unthinking obedience to include demands that ANY church, church groups or group of churches get approval from city hall before taking any action. They proceeded to demand obedience to council dictates, even where the people involved felt that the council dictates were against their spiritual beliefs and the teachings of their faith.

This attempt to place council’s temporal dictates above matters of faith, spirituality and the teachings of Christ failed to impress the audience.

When the city failed to offer anything rational¹ to support their orders, the Pastor declined to comply with the city’s dictatorial demands. Leaving the matter unresolved and the Pastor and public waiting on which police state tactic the City will attempt to force obedience with next.

Footnote:

¹ The Smith-Beck-Harris Cheerios Theory on the causality homelessness and addiction was unveiled before the public for the first time at Abbotsford City Hall on Wednesday May 7.

According to the theory espoused by Abbotsford City councillors John Smith, Bruce Beck and Lynne Harris, endorsed by Abbotsford Downtown Business Association president Bob Bos, the social problems that have spilled into the city’s Jubilee Park are being worsened by a Church that serves Cheerios early Thursday mornings in the Park.

A further tenant of the Smith-Beck-Harris Cheerio Theory, associating the serving of Cheerios with the presence of persons suffering homelessness and addiction in Jubilee Park, is that if the church Pastor and congregation members would cease serving Cheerios the Park would no longer be a “sick park” as they termed it.

One of the persecution witnesses presented by the city, when asked for clarification, stated that the swelling population in the park are homeless and addicts from Vancouver.

With Cheerios never having been one of my breakfast cereal choices I had no idea the allure of Cheerios was so powerful that hearing a church was serving Cheerios Thursday mornings in Jubilee Park in Abbotsford would have the homeless and addicted leaving all the resources to be found in Vancouver to Abbotsford’s Jubilee Park.

Under the Smith-Beck-Harris Cheerios Theory should city council not be solving Abbotsford’s homeless and addiction social problems by leading a campaign to remove Cheerios from store shelves and making Abbotsford a “Cheerios Free Zone”?

Parents be warned: do not supply your children with Cheerios. Next thing you know it will be Fruit Loops the – gasp – Lucky Charms!