Not Alone
By Rachel Tulloch and Janice Towndrow
I met Janice here at Sanctuary about 14 years ago, and she has become a close friend—like part of my family—despite the fact that we share different backgrounds and are in different seasons of life. We have shared our hearts and ideas (and a lot of laughter!) through the course of many conversations over the years. Her story, like so many others in our community, includes a lot of pain from fractured family relationships.
In Janice’s case, this happened after her coming out as transgender in adulthood and being disowned by her family. While the rejection hurt deeply, it was not a surprise to her because she had already learned over the years that other differences, such as her epilepsy, were not accepted: “When it comes down to it, I was not the person they wanted.”
This time in Janice’s life was devastatingly difficult—losing her whole immediate and extended family and winding up in a tiny, rat-infested room in a filthy rooming house in downtown Toronto, without a bed or a functional bathroom. During difficult times in my own life, I have often struggled with feeling abandoned by God. But Janice says that “even though that was the worst of situations, it was the closest I have been to God.” Listening to the Bible every night as she tried to sleep gave her comfort and a deep sense that she was not alone. She particularly loves the Psalms, and in them she encountered a verse that really stuck with her during those difficult days:
“When my father and mother forsake me,
Then the Lord will take care of me.”
Janice found reassurance that she is not alone through the ancient words of scripture. And I am convinced that ultimately she is right—when everything else falls apart, God sees and knows each of us in our uniqueness and holds us in a deep, abiding love, whether we know it or not.
But it is hard to hold on to that knowledge of God’s love for long if we don’t also experience love from others in our lives. And thankfully, Janice eventually found her way to Sanctuary, which she describes as a family for her, and she has become family to many of us as well.
We hear a lot that we are living in the middle of a housing crisis, and we see the effects of this all around us. But we are also experiencing a crisis of home. We all know that home means more than four walls and a roof—it is about belonging, relationships, and memories built together. And yet, in our time and place, too many people of all backgrounds and levels of privilege feel alone. And in our Sanctuary community, too many people have experienced both a lack of housing and the loneliness that comes from the absence of a group of people you can really count on. We are learning together what it means to love each other as we are and to hold onto each other through the good and the hard that life throws at us. Many other communities are also finding creative ways of offering mutual care during these times of loneliness as well.
I recently watched the Pixar film Elio with my kids, which contains a line that sums up the movie’s heart: “Unique can feel like alone, but you are not alone.” In these times when more and more people are being rendered houseless and/or homeless, may we all consider how we can live and love in ways that say to more people, “You are not alone.”