Trinity's Historic Cemetery has been TRANSFORMED! | Trinity Talks Podcast

Today on Trinity Talks, we are having a conversation that you do not want to miss.

Along with Heather Smith, we are talking about a project here at Trinity that tells a story.

A story that actually began with many stories many years ago.

This is a story that is deeply rooted in history, with a heart for the people and community of today,

and with a dream for generations to come.

Walk along with us as we tell you the story of a vision, dedication, generosity, and innovation,

and learn how you too can be a part of the next chapters in this story.

Well, thanks for joining me today for a very special outdoor episode of Trinity Talks.

I'm grateful for the nice weather that we have here.

In fact, I am joined with Heather Smith, and Heather Smith is the team lead of the cemetery here

at Trinity Streetsville.

And we really just wanted to showcase the beauty that is this cemetery here today.

This cemetery is steeped in history, and up until recently, in recent years,

it has really actually flown quite under the radar.

But it was Heather who had the vision to not only beautify this space, but make it usable,

and well, I'll leave it to her to really tell us all about it.

Heather, what was it about this cemetery that really struck a chord in your heart?

When did you really decide that this was a project you wanted to take on?

Well, like a lot of people, I had paid really very little attention to the cemetery.

Lots of people in the church didn't even know we had a cemetery.

Likewise, yeah.

It was just a walled-off space, and it was very under cared for, let's put it that way.

But in 2021, I had just retired, and thinking about something to do,

and Natalie asked me if I would help with the cemetery paperwork.

All cemeteries have to apply certain kinds of forms to the government a couple of times a year.

So I said, oh, sure, that would be easy.

Well, little did I know that we had so many different types of records,

it took me about two weeks to pull them all together,

because they were in different formats, different places, different people in the church had responsibilities for them.

So it was a lot more complex process.

And I'm an IT person by background, training, and career,

and I thought, there's got to be a better way to do this.

So it was something that called out for a little more attention.

Then I started looking into it, into how it was, the cemetery was organized and managed,

and I realized that it could use a great deal more attention than it had been.

So it dawned on me then, and I talked to a couple of the previous cemetery leaders who had moved on to other churches,

but I called them and talked to them.

And I realized then that the cemetery had a lot more potential.

It just needed someone to catalyze that potential.

There had been projects in the past, but they've been very piecemeal and low key.

And quite frankly, nobody really wanted to put money into the cemetery.

So there was really no overarching vision of how the cemetery should be managed or what the cemetery could be.

So most people in leadership saw the cemeteries and expense, not an asset.

And so I thought, oh, maybe we could turn this around.

Well, turn it around.

You did.

So what people don't always understand also is that cemeteries are part of the church's mission

because they're a symbol of the promise of the day of resurrection.

And so it's our responsibility to honor our saints and also to remember them

and also to reflect on the promise of the gospel, which is the day of resurrection.

So to make it beautiful and remember it is a sign.

So I also wanted to make it just a place where people could stop and meditate on their lives, a quiet space,

meditate on their loved ones, whether living or dead.

And so that's what I felt God was calling me to do.

And what's fascinating is the deeper I got into it, the more I learned about it, the more exciting it's become.

So we really do have a jewel that can be cleaned up and repurposed for contemporary needs and modern ministry.

So I just felt that we could make the Trinity Cemetery and Trinity Church more welcoming to all by making a beautiful, accessible space over the cemetery.

Well, I think that was an absolutely beautiful answer.

And I've had the privilege of actually walking with you sort of from the beginning.

Yes, that's right.

Where I saw this seed be planted in your heart that you did not let go.

Instead, you kept watering and tending it.

But I must say that I don't think it could have been done and you would, I'm sure, agree without an amazing team of people.

That's right.

Who are talented and driven and also equally passionate about this project.

So I know that you were able to put together a small yet talented committee of people who came up with a vision and a mission as well as goals,

because that's how you could then focus your project.

So what were those?

Well, and you were very helpful in helping us pull those together.

We had a small group of people who had been with the Cemetery Dean for a number of years.

And when I started, I invited a couple of other people with I hoped complementary skills to join us.

And the first thing we did was figure out what we wanted to do, what we wanted to be as a cemetery.

And that means developing a vision, mission and goals.

And then we had to get Trinity's leadership to agree to it as well.

So that's what we did.

And we have these vision and mission and goals have been really, really effective at focusing our team and our work

and helping other people to know what we're trying to do.

So I bring them out with every single thing that I do now.

It's an anchor.

Yeah.

That's right.

So the slide shows that our vision is to create a beautiful, healthy cemetery that magnifies God and honors our saints.

Our mission as a team is to provide leadership in achieving this vision, working collaboratively with church leadership and management.

And we have five goals.

First, we want to preserve the cemetery.

This is Streetsville's history right here.

Second, we want to beautify our history and make it more attractive and visually appealing.

Next, we want to engage the church and our external community because we're out in the open.

It gives us a chance to welcome the external community as well with our ministry, to engage them with our ministry in a variety of ways.

And then we would the boring stuff is we want to improve our cemeteries, operations, administration and record keeping.

Yes.

And finally, we want to create self sustainability in our finances so that we want to forever dispel the myth that the cemetery is a drain on church finances because it isn't.

It actually brings money in.

Yeah.

It's not an expense, an asset.

Yes.

That's right.

Now, visions are great.

The mission is wonderful and the goals are excellent.

However, this can't be done for free.

No.

Everything comes at a cost and I know that you've been working and this has all been revealed to you quite obviously over the last couple of years.

But I was wondering if we could talk a little bit about the financial support that we've gained from this.

Okay.

Before funding, you have to know how much you're asking for.

Yes.

And you have to be able to paint a compelling picture and tell a story about what you're trying to do.

That was the next goal for us was to try and figure once we had our vision, mission and goals, we thought, how are we going to best implement these?

And it didn't happen right away.

It took a few months of us noodling around.

But we talked to first of all, we talked to landscape professionals and they very helpfully volunteered to give us a beautiful landscape design.

And then we talked to a professional artists.

We got some images.

And then we actually got an accurate budget together, which involved talking to a contractor and figuring out what we needed to do.

So those were the tough steps that we had to do first.

And then we formed what we call the Restoration Project Team all the way, every step along the way, we went back to the wardens and to Rob and got permission to carry on the next step.

So we got the Restoration Project Team together in January 2022.

And we got permission at that point.

They were everybody was still very skeptical.

So we got permission at that point to begin to explore external fundraising, not to go to the church.

Our plan had three dimensions.

First of all, we wanted to create a prayer garden honoring Sam and Hazel McCallion, who were very prominent Mississauga citizens, streets hill citizens, and also members of a Trinity congregation.

We also wanted to highlight the cemetery's history.

We are a city of Mississauga heritage, historic heritage site, and we have three members of the War of 1812 militia buried here.

So, and a lot of streets fills founders as well.

And finally, we wanted to create a beautiful, useful green space for the church and also cuz streets fill is really underserved in park space.

So this is a this is going to be an asset to the community as well.

Those are all three very multi dimensional reasons in order to restore the cemetery.

So once we had our story, our pictures and our budget together, we were able to start fundraising.

That's exciting. So the first part of that project you mentioned was the Sam and Hazel McCallion prayer garden.

Would you like to come and take a look?

Yeah, I'll take a look.

Well, I feel at peace just standing here. I do. Could you tell us a little bit about this space that we're standing in within the cemetery right now, Heather?

Well, it's an idea that just came to me one day. I was having a chat with Dave twice and I thought, I got it. We'll do a prayer garden honoring Sam and Hazel McCallion.

So I thought about it and worked on it and we added it to our vision.

And as you most of you know, Hazel was Mississauga's beloved mayor and before that, Streetsville's wreath for many, many decades.

Yes. And her husband was a prominent businessman here and the congregation, they were members of the congregation since the middle 50s.

So and they've done many things for the church and for the community.

So it is very fitting that we honor them in this way. And also we wanted something that would be a connection with the community and Hazel was it.

So the first thing after we had the design and the story is we went to visit Hazel and talked to her and got her approval for this.

Wow. So and there's a picture, you may be able to dig it up of me with Hazel in the prayer garden in the beginnings of the prayer garden.

I know that picture. We'll get it up on the screen here.

So she actually had a chance to visit it before she died. She knew it was happening. So I'm really pleased about that.

So then what we did was we approached two foundations, Hazel's foundation and another foundation that's closely associated with art with me, actually.

And we got their initial donations for the cause. And then that provided the seed funding for further donations.

Once people have seen that other people have donated, it gives them confidence that the project will happen.

So that's when we started community fundraising in a big way.

And I've got to say, the majority of the funding, the large majority of this funding came from the community, not from the church.

Wonderful. Wonderful. Yeah. Thanks, Heather.

Now, I'd love to be actually just inside your head, as you said, that idea just popped into your head.

So there's this is one project, but one project of many.

So could you tell me a little bit about some of the other projects that have been undertaken here?

The restoration project is the big overarching. When we first started, we thought, OK, we'll start with the prayer garden.

And over the years, we will do more.

But interestingly, this project caught the community's vision and we got exceptionally supportive funding for it.

So one of the things we've done, if you want to take a look around here, we've paved the pathways.

These are all part of the the original pathways in the original cemetery plan.

Wow. They're beautiful and they're fresh. That's right.

And we planted trees along that barren church wall.

And I wanted to make sure that we could get an accessible path to the columbarium, too,

because too many people were walking through the mud to get to to their loved ones, internment services.

And then we wanted to do some other things. We clean up our gravestones.

So we learned how to do that and we had volunteers come and clean up our gravestones.

We leveled the cemetery, too. It hadn't been leveled in 150 years and it was ankle breaking.

Excellent. We might try to get some pictures up on the screen here of what the cemetery was previously and what we've got up as well.

That would be great. So we've what else have we done? We painted the fence. It was all rusted.

Finally, the last thing we did was we added a pathway. This wasn't part of our original plan at all.

But we added a pathway from the cemetery to the church.

So now this cemetery is fully accessible.

And, you know, as you may know, a lot it's a lot of seniors who come to visit the cemetery.

And so they're very appreciative of the ease of access.

And I've loved seeing it being used over these last couple of weeks.

I've seen people come in and certainly there is an ease of access that welcomes people. That's right.

That was the whole point. So that's what we've done.

And our latest project is to beautify the Columbarium.

And we're still working on it.

But what we've done is widened the patio so that more people can actually stand during an internment service.

And we put up a safety barrier there.

There's a bench there and we've improved the landscaping.

But I still have more plans to do it if we can afford it.

Oh, I'm sure you do. And it's always it's always great.

Let's take a seat over here at the benches because I'd like to talk about a project that you haven't mentioned yet.

And this one really taps into the historical aspect of your restoration project.

And that is a database that is being developed or has been developed even on our website.

Well, it's the it's the historical element, but it's also the operational and administrative and financial element.

Because when I took over in 2021, we had multiple cemetery registries and we had multiple in multiple formats.

And it was impossible to know where our bodies were buried.

So what we did is that first year, one of our team members researched different kinds of cemetery software, found Chronicle.

And I'll give you the website because it's open to the public afterwards at the end.

So she found Chronicle and we sent them all our maps and cemetery records.

They were all all different. Yeah.

And they had did a drone survey of the cemetery and they pulled it all together into this database that is combined all the processes that we need to sell and register a grave and all of the operational processes.

But also allows us to provide pictures of loved ones and biographical information and to make it because it's all cloud based.

Anyone can access it. It's all public access. That's exciting. Yeah.

Wonderful. Now, I just want to talk a little bit about the actual spaces here within the cemetery.

Now, I understand that burial plots as well as columbarium niches are reserved for members of Trinity or people that are associated with members of Trinity.

And are there any spaces left like the columbarium or the plots?

Well, in recent years, because we haven't had good records, we haven't really sold graves at all because we really don't know.

Even though we had some records, we really didn't know whether there were other people who we didn't understand or very there.

Yes. So we've mainly been selling columbarium niches. Yes.

And those are still available. And that's where most people, if they want to be interred in the cemetery, can will buy.

But once we had our map, our online map, we could see that there were many possibly empty graves in the cemetery.

So another one of our team members found a ground penetrating radar company.

And later this summer, they're coming out to over here to survey a small chunk of our what we call Potter's Field, where there are a number of empty, potentially empty graves.

So they'll do the you know, we have to do it in small pieces because it's expensive.

And so they'll do that and crunch the numbers. And if we have graves, if there are graves that are available, we can start selling graves again later on this fall or early next year.

That's incredible. I have to say that from conversations with you over the last couple of years, and this is an all honest truth, I have learned so much, not just about what a cemetery is, but so many different disciplines.

That's what's so exciting about the cemetery. From science to IT to horticulture.

Yeah, exactly.

And even geology and how the earth works. I've learned so much from you, Heather.

But I also hear that there's really space for everybody to come and participate. How can people come and get involved?

Well, that's right. Well, if you're interested in, most people when they think about the cemetery, they think about maintaining a cemetery and its physical way.

We have lots of opportunities for that.

This fall we're planning to plant 750 daffodils and a one day extravaganza to make a really spectacular spring display in the cemetery.

So if you want to just come out for one day and volunteer to plant daffodils, that's when you watch out for our shout out. But also, I mean, we have opportunities for gardeners to come and help in this beautiful, create this.

We're just beginning to beautify this space.

We have lots of ideas, care possible. And then, but also, if you just like weightlifting, we have the opportunity to come and help raise some of our grapes that have sunk down and we can sure do that or if you like power tools.

Okay.

So there's tree pruning and lots of other things to do. But we also have opportunities with the new database now. What I want to do is populate the database with pictures and biographical information.

If you are a photographer or a journalist, you'd like to capture some oral history of some of the family members who have loved ones injured here, we'd like to hear from you. And if you're a historian and you'd like to look into some of the deeper history of the cemetery, we can take that.

We can involve you too.

But also, project leaders, I mean, doing a lot of stuff requires a lot of coordination, I can't do it all. No. So project leaders are very welcome as well.

And my next plan is to begin developing a ministry for the cemetery. We don't do well talking about or understanding death and what the church's beliefs and teachings are about death, and just some actual facts about it.

So I want to sometimes, the cemetery is often the first place that people get in touch with the church, or they come in touch with death.

And so what we want to do is help people through this difficult time, connect them with our existing church and resources, and also to provide them with easy straightforward ways to see their way through the processes and decisions that make, and then also in the longer term, provide them with opportunities to remember and mourn their loved ones.

So that's my next project is pulling that all together.

That's great. That's really leads a lot to be excited about. It does. And it really does leave it open to involving like you said, making it a community space.

And it's absolutely gorgeous and we've had wonderful help from many community members to come and volunteer to help to spring and fall clean up for example. Yes. So anyway, if any of these opportunities interests you.

I always want to hear from volunteers, feel free to connect with Heather or even the church in general, just to the office, and they will make sure that you get in touch with the right people so that you can be a part of this amazing space.

I'm going to sit here for just probably a few more minutes but that is the end of Trinity Talks. That's right. So thank you very much Heather for taking the time today on this gorgeous day to share your wisdom and expertise on the cemetery.

You're very welcome and thank you for giving me the opportunity. All right, take care everyone.