How Can You Think That?! Political Book Club: Encampment by Maggie Helwig

A book club for conservatives and liberals who want to get out of their echo chambers and bridge the great divide. Buy the book, read it, and come join us for a lively discussion.

This month's book is Encampment: Resistance, Grace, and an Unhoused Community by Maggie Helwig.

About the book

An activist priest provides sanctuary for an encampment of unhoused people in her churchyard.

The housing crisis plaguing major urban centres has sent countless people into the streets. In spring 2022, some of them found their way to the yard beside the Anglican church in Toronto’s Kensington Market, where Maggie Helwig is the priest. They pitched tents, formed an encampment, and settled in. Known as an outspoken social justice activist, Helwig has spent the last three years getting to know the residents and fighting tooth and nail to allow them to stay, battling various authorities that want to clear the yard and keep the results of the housing crisis out of sight and out of mind.

Encampment tells the story of Helwig’s life-long activism as preparation for her fight to keep her churchyard open to people needing a home. More importantly, it introduces us to the Artist, to Jeff, and to Robin: their lives, their challenges, their humanity. It confronts our society’s callousness in allowing so many to go unhoused and demands, by bringing their stories to the fore, that we begin to respond with compassion and grace.