Heart Garden & Bell Ringing

The Anglican Parish of Huntley needs Hearts and Bell Ringers to help us honour and remember the Aboriginal peoples of our country!

Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (www.TRC.ca) which has addressed the sad legacy of the Indian Residential Schools will hold its final event, the closing ceremonies of its six-year tenure, in Ottawa for four days commencing on Sunday, May 31^st. Communities across the country are being asked to consider different ways that they can recognize this momentous occasion and honour the beginning of the final TRC events (May 31^st). Further to this, communities are asked to continue to remember and reflect for #22days between the beginning of the TRC events (May 31^st) and the National Aboriginal Day of Prayer on June 21^st.

The Parish of Huntley has chosen two activities, a heart garden and bell ringing, to remember and reflect and are inviting all individuals, families and/or groups in the Carp area to assist them. These two activities aim to provide opportunities for all members of our neighbourhood to reflect upon and consider the importance of reconciliation, awareness, and commitment from all Canadians to restore and nurture right relations based on mutual respect amongst future generations of all peoples.

The Heart Garden needs your Hearts! The Anglican Parish of Huntley will plant a Heart Garden on Sunday, May 31^st and members of the community are invited to stop by the front garden of the Parish Hall (3774 Carp Road) anytime between May 31^st and June 21^st to plant a heart of their own. Hearts made of any material can be placed by individuals, community groups, and families. We encourage you to create a heart that is no bigger then 4 x 6 and place it in the garden attached to a small popsicle stick. Youth in our parish have made theirs with small wood heart cutouts and glitter paint but hearts painted on rocks or cut outs of hearts on a stick are also great options!

The Carp Heart Garden will be one of many planted across the country (and across the world) to remember and reflect on the impacts of residential schools in our country, the largest Heart Garden will be located at Rideau Hall. (For more information check out www.kairoscanada.org/time4reconciliation).

Help us Ring the Bells! Between May 31^st and June 21^st cathedrals and churches across Canada are encouraged to ring bells for each of the 1017 indigenous women and girls murdered between 1980 and 2012 and for the 164 indigenous women and girls classified by the RCMP as missing in suspicious circumstances, 1181 in total. To ring bells in solidarity with the Indigenous peoples in their cry for justice the Anglican Parish of Huntley will ring their church bells a total of 1181 times over the 22 days between May 31^st and June 21^st. Families, groups, and individuals are invited to sign up below for one of the bell-ringing timeslots that are available. Each bell ringing timeslot is thirty minutes long and requires an individual and/or group to ring the bells a total of fifty times in the half-hour period. No experience is necessary and participants will be guided when they arrive to ring the bells of the church. By June 21^st the bells of the parish will have been rung 1181 times by people from throughout our community. The bell ringing will culminate with a special Eucharist service at each of our three church locations to honour the National Aboriginal Day of Prayer.

For more information email the Reverend Monique Stone at huntleypriest@bellnet.ca (phone # is 613-839-3195).

We hope that you might consider being a part of these activities and encourage you to join your neighbours and friends from throughout Carp!