Award-winning columnist Deacon Robert Kinghorn has assembled a collection of his Catholic Register columns into a new book, The Church on the Street. In this excerpt, he explains his calling to minister to the forsaken on the streets of Toronto.

Sad reminder

Re: Nine priests identified in Archdiocese of Vancouver report on sexual abuse (Dec. 1):

Sensory Mass

Re: Mass… the sensory-friendly way (Nov. 10):

I was thrilled to read the article on sensory-friendly Masses. I would like to add that it is not only children who have trouble processing sensory input. I have fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome and multiple chemical sensitivities. All forms of sensory input can be painful and overwhelming for me. 

The Church on the Street

By Deacon Robert Kinghorn

Deacon Robert Kinghorn invites readers to walk with him as he ministers in a crime-ridden Toronto neighbourhood of drugs, prostitution, violence and homelessness. Praised as powerful and engaging, his descriptions of encounters with the downtrodden reveal not just the despair and disorder of the streets but also the compassion and even hope in a poor, crime-ridden downtown Toronto neighbourhood. Kinghorn began a street ministry in 2005 to be “a friend who would listen to the cares, dreams and hopes of the people of the night.” For the past four years he has chronicled those experiences in Canada’s national Catholic newspaper, The Catholic Register, in an award-winning column called The Church on the Street. The most poignant of those short essays are assembled in this book. His writing has been called unique in terms of his subjects and approach. The “humble, observational way” he takes readers with him on his journeys into the night are not intended as sermons — his style is anything but preachy — yet, in the words of one critic, his words “teach powerfully.” “Deacon Kinghorn bears faithful witness to the humility, compassion and generosity of ordained ministry,” wrote Cardinal Thomas Collins in the foreword to the book.

Canadian orders: 144 pages / Paperback / 5.5"x8.5" / $16.00 + $4.00 shipping / ISBN 978-0-99487-16-3-3 / © 2019 Catholic Register Books

US orders: 144 pages / Paperback / 5.5"x8.5" / $16.00 + $6.00 shipping / ISBN 978-0-99487-16-3-3 / © 2019 Catholic Register Books

International orders: 144 pages / Paperback / 5.5"x8.5" / $16.00 + $10.00 shipping / ISBN 978-0-99487-16-3-3 / © 2019 Catholic Register Books

LONDON, Ont. -- The Diocese of London has launched a new endowment fund to aid agencies that support the needs of the underprivileged.

Wrong decision

Re: Toronto Catholic board votes to include gender terms (Nov. 17):