The Council of the North has appointed veteran activist and community organizer Cynthia Patterson as the co-ordinator of new suicide prevention programs. “It’s exciting to know that [the Council of the North] wants to move in this way,” Patterson said. “It is a question of opening the doors and going out.”As co-founder of Rural Dignity, she has worked for more than 20 years in Quebec’s Gaspe region to maintain infrastructure such as postal and railway services. Patterson has served on the Anglican Church of Canada’s eco-justice committee for six years. She was also appointed to the Anglican Peace and Justice Network of the Anglican Communion and helped to establish a partnership between dioceses in Quebec, Burundi and Scotland. She has worked to build partnerships between health institutions and agencies, and grass-root community groups. Her task now will be to link communities to the best health and suicide prevention resources.
Anglican Angels hard at work
It is the generosity of Anglicans across Canada that is making it possible for the Council of the North to establish suicide prevention programs to improve the lives of people in small, isolated communities.Funding was raised vis-a-vis the Amazing Grace project. Anglican parishes and groups across Canada gave a total of $97,000.
