Kendra Fry - Rural and Remote Churches - What's Next?

Clearing a New Path™

Kendra Fry - Rural and Remote Churches - What's Next?

This episode came about when I was looking up how many churches are for sale or even abandoned in rural and remote Canada. I couldn’t find a current number but I did find a story about the selling off of Catholic churches in Newfoundland. In 1999, 39 men — former residents of Mount Cashel Orphanage in St. John’s — filed statements of claim at Newfoundland and Labrador Supreme Court claiming they were abused during the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s by members of the Irish Christian Brothers, who ran the orphanage. They won and since the Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. John’s appeal in 2021, over 100 men have come forward. Their claims exceed 50 million dollars. Hence selling off churches to pay.

I was then looking for people who had an expertise in repurposing or re-imagining churches no longer in use, or even abandoned. That’s when I found Kendra Fry.

Kendra has a long career in the arts mostly as a General Manager in theatre before beginning her work creating multi sectoral community hubs for the common good. Working with partners from across Canada, Kendra unlocks the hidden value in historic building sites, creating broad cross-sectoral community centres that involve the arts, housing, food security, education and many other not for profit organizations. Some of her better- known sites include Carlton University at Dominion Chalmers, Crescent Fort Rouge Centre in Winnipeg, Copperlight in Stratford and Trinity St. Paul’s Centre and Eastminster United in Toronto. She is currently working on eighteen sites across Canada.

Kendra is the author along with Milton Friesen of “No Space for Community; An in depth look into the loss of infrastructure due to faith building closures in Ontario '' which can be read at www.communityspacefaithplace.org.

This study of not for profit and community usage of faith buildings was created in partnership with the Ontario Trillium Foundation, Ontario Nonprofit Network, Cardus, the City of Toronto and Faith & the Common Good.

Kendra is an Associate with the National Trust for Canada where she works on enhancing the community value of, and engagement with historic places including museums, faith buildings, cultural sites and historic landscapes.

Kendra is also the General Manager of Stratford Summer Music , a summer festival that produces 40 concerts and one collaborative cross sectoral arts weekend each summer.

You can see some of her projects at www.creativecollisions.org

Trinity Centres Foundation’s: STRATEGY COURSE FOR CHURCH BOARD MEMBERS

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