THE MONTHLY GLEANER | FEBRUARY 15 - MARCH 16, 2024 | www.jamaica-gleaner.com | NEWS 5 Pastor Eddie Jjumba, Pastor Judith James, and Dr Andrew B. Campbell honoured for their work at the 24th annual Boonoonoonos Brunch, organised by the Jamaican Canadian Association on February 11 at the Jamaican Canadian Community Centre in Toronto. CONTRIBUTED seekers who were left to live on city streets for several months. “They were systematically shut out until The Beautiful Foundation spearheaded the movement with the generosity of her church, Revivaltime Tabernacle. Their response ignited other churches to join the movement in turning the churches into the true meaning of a sanctuary,” said Patterson in her introduction of James, who was listed in Toronto Life magazine’s ‘50 Most Influential People of 2023’. Pastor James said when her foundation answered the call to help the refugees, she did not know what she was going to do. However, she received a call from Dr Sylvanus Thompson of the JCA and the association provided breakfast for the entire first week. James thanked her son Jalen Joshua and daughter Jasmine-Rose, and members of The Beautiful Foundation for their support. “I truly believe that my existence as well as yours is the resistance. My existence is a resistance to hate, my existence is a resistance to all injustice. My existence is a resistance to the demonic tyranny trying to suppress the black woman. My existence is a resistance to the black Church being silent when, really, we are the core of our black society. My existence, and your existence, is the resistance.” James said she stands on the shoulders of her late father, Reverend Dr Audley Neville James, who was a proud Jamaican from Wakefield, Trelawny, and her mother, Reverend Rosenda Adelfiha James, founder of Adelfiha’s Christian Academy. Keynote speaker Dr Jean Augustine, whose advocacy as the first black woman to be elected to Parliament resulted in Black History Month being officially recognised in 1995, said the story of African Canadians has always been one of struggle and resistance. In reflecting on the time since her arrival in Canada from Grenada in 1960, she said there were demonstrations every weekend in Toronto. “It was the way to get our message out,” she said, noting that black history is Canadian history. She was pleased that the Ontario government recently announced that black history will be mandatory in the history curriculum for grades seven, eight and 10 students, starting in September 2025.
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