Editor’s Note: The Banner does not necessarily advocate for supervised consumption sites, but this book’s provocative thesis, from a faith perspective, is something we think our readers could engage with critical thinking.
When author Meera Bai Grover was employed at Insite, Canada’s first supervised consumption site for illicit drugs in Vancouver’s infamous downtown eastside, she was plagued with questions about her role as a Christian in that setting: “Was it immoral for me to help people inject drugs? Could I, as a nurse, help somebody find a vein if I knew they were just going to inject drugs into it? Wasn’t I enabling them? Shouldn’t I instead be telling them about the love of Christ so they can renounce the drugs and start a completely different life?”
In her compelling, thought-provoking, and at times disturbing memoir, Dr. Grover, who became an addiction medicine physician after a career in nursing, calls on Christians to engage in soul-searching about their attitude toward people who use illicit drugs and the role of supervised consumption sites.
Chronicling her own shift in perspective, Grover explains how working at supervised consumption sites provided her with a window into God’s work in people’s lives: “I have seen that God is present in the supervised consumption sites, acting through the nurses as they bring people back, breathing life into them. God is present in the distribution of safe supply, in the prayers of those who hope that the uncontaminated drugs will keep patients alive until their addiction can be treated. God is present among the patients who, at the end of the month, share their alcohol with their friends at the cost of increasing their own withdrawals, so that nobody has to drink mouthwash or hand sanitizer to avoid having a withdrawal seizure. All these are small moments where the presence of God is tangibly visible. You just have to look to find them.”
Grover relates gut-wrenching anecdotes and hope-filled stories from her work and the lives of the people she encountered. She expounds on basic medical addiction-related concepts to explain the current opioid crisis, spells out options for treatment for patients defined by the justice system, points to the “complicity of the medical system,” and unveils the ways Christians have failed to understand or care about her patients.
Engaging and riveting, Why I Help People Take Drugs is a call for Christians to perceive supervised consumption sites and the people who use them with merciful eyes: “Grace, the foundation of the gospel, the message that God has tried and tried again to hammer into our heads, grace is the core of what happens at supervised consumption sites.”
(Cascade Books)
About the Author
Sonya VanderVeen Feddema is a freelance writer and a member of Covenant CRC in St. Catharines, Ontario.