WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER
I walk by the Kits Community Centre almost every day. It sits on the corner of Vine and 7th: a familiar, friendly landmark in a neighbourhood where people walk dogs, push strollers, carry yoga mats, and chat over coffee. For months, I passed a little structure outside its wall: a dry-goods pantry painted white and green, with a small fridge beside it. The hand-lettered sign above it reads, Give what you can, take what you need.
A lovely idea, I thought. And I kept walking.
Sometimes there were a few cans on the shelf, or a small bag of pasta. Sometimes a toothbrush or deodorant in the toiletries box. Sometimes nothing at all. I never really paused long enough to see a pattern or the people who depended on it.
And then, a few weeks ago, everything changed.
A friend was walking with me, and as we passed the pantry she stopped. “What a beautiful thing,” she said. “The neighbourhood sharing with itself.” I nodded. And we walked on.
Later that day, I saw an older couple approach the pantry. They spoke softly to one another in an accent that sounded Ukrainian. They opened the door. Empty. Not a single item. Their shoulders fell. They shuffled away, quietly, without complaint: simply with hunger.
That moment stayed with me.
Over the next two weeks, I started paying attention. Really paying attention. And what I saw broke my heart.
I saw seniors on fixed incomes. Newcomers to Canada. A man living out of his van parked down the block. A woman from the neighbourhood whom I know by sight but not by name. People who looked like they were doing “fine” until you watched the way they checked the shelves. At least thirty people a day came by. Sometimes more.
And more often than not, there was nothing there.
My friend had begun dropping off food multiple times daily over those 2 weeks. Balanced staples: rice, lentils, canned beans, tomato sauce. Enough for simple, nourishing meals. Nothing gourmet just the kind of food that keeps a person going. A $48 trip to Costco stretched into four or five days of twice-daily drops. And even then, food vanished almost immediately.
People are hungry. Right here, in the middle of one of the wealthiest neighbourhoods in Vancouver.
But here is what struck me most: I had walked past this pantry hundreds of times. I had admired it as a symbol without recognizing it as a lifeline. It took an outsider’s eyes to make me see what was right in front of me.
Once you see it, you can’t unsee it.
And once you know how simple it is to help: how a bag of rice or a flat of canned tomatoes can change someone’s day it becomes impossible not to act.
So here is what I’m doing. And here is where I need you.
Between now and Christmas, I want to ensure this pantry never sits empty. I’ve placed a box outside my office door at the Cathedral and I’ll have it upstairs on Sundays by the greeters desk. I’m asking you — our community — to help me keep it filled with canned protein, pasta, rice, nut butters, soups, and other staples. Nothing extravagant. Just what you can give.
Because the sign painted on the side of that little pantry is true:
We’re all in this together.
When the most vulnerable among us; the elderly, the widowed, the newcomers, the working poor, the single parents go hungry, something in all of us goes hungry too.
But when we lift one another up, quietly and faithfully, the whole community rises.
I’ll do the daily drops on our behalf through the end of the year. I’ll bring the food. I’ll restock the shelves. I’ll be the hands.
I’m asking you to be the heart.
Let’s make sure that no one in our neighbourhood walks away from that pantry disappointed this Christmas.