MDS summer service youth work project in Toronto

Each summer Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) organizes a Summer Youth Work Project as a way of offering church youth groups a way to experience a new context and the opportunity of working together with peers. This year the site was downtown Toronto in the St. Jamestown neighbourhood where 18 high rise apartment blocks are concentrated in a 32 acre city block. Over 30,000 people live in this neighbourhood. The Salvation Army and Mennonite Brethren Church have joined forces to start a church planting effort in the midst of this very urban context calling themselves 614 St. Jamestown. The facilities they had available to them were worn and tired in much need of upgrading. So during the month of July various youth groups converged for a week at a time to work with the 614 St. Jamestown group. Please read the article here or see the published versions in the Mennonite Brethren Herald http://www.mbherald.com/46/09/people-2.en.html and the MDS magazine Behind the Hammer, September issue http://mds.mennonite.net/MDS_Stories/Newsletters.
You may also see more photos and descriptions on my Picassa web album: http://picasaweb.google.com/g.bruce.hildebrand/2007MDSSUMMERYOUTHPROJECT