Purpose & History

Welcome to the website for the Ecumenical Good Friday Walk for Justice.

After the torch-light red on sweaty faces
After the frosty silence in the gardens
After the agony in stony places
The shouting and the crying
Prison and place and reverberation
Of thunder of spring over distant mountains
He who was living is now dead
We who were living are now dying
With a little patience
The Waste Land (T.S. Eliot, 1922)

Good Friday marks the execution of Jesus. We are invited to live our lives in the hope and promise of resurrection; but we do not forget that dreadful death and that dark day. Around the world and in the midst of our communities, Christ is crucified daily in the bodies and being of the poor, the marginalised, the oppressed, the forgotten. The Powers that Be continue to wash their hands.

Will we look the other way?

Good Friday Walk is sponsored by a coalition of churches/ecumenical organisations in Toronto.

History

The Good Friday Walk for Justice began in 1979 with a walk to five downtown stations organised by Teachers for Social Justice, a group of Roman Catholic teachers in Toronto. The walk shifted in 1980 to focus on the Toronto manufacturer Litton Industries, builder of the guidance systems for U.S. cruise missiles, with hundreds of people taking part in a Good Friday walk and prayer rally at the Litton site in Rexdale. By 1985 the ecumenical Good Friday Walk for Justice had moved to the streets of downtown Toronto, broadening the focus to include a wide variety of issues of social justice and peace as it sought to provide a public witness against the forces of death in contemporary society that crucify people still.