I spent most of this week wrestling with a decision about an upcoming trip. As I often do when facing a dilemma, I pondered and prayed. After several clear signs came my way, I decided that taking a stand needed to win out over my desire to escape this cold, Canadian winter.

Welcome to the 102^nd edition of The Sunday Spark, a series with weekly thoughts and highlights, nuggets of learning, and a simple living challenge for the week. In addition to taking a stand, this week’s edition looks at Canada’s plans for high speed rail, resources to help you buy Canadian, and repurposing hotel soap scraps.

On my mind this week: Heeding the signs and taking a stand

This week, I was faced with a go/no-go decision about an upcoming trip to Tucson, Arizona to attend a committee meeting for the professional association that I volunteer with. Normally my plans would have been confirmed weeks ago, but every time I went to book flights, I couldn’t do it.

Escaping the harsh winter of 2025 for a few days sounds great, but I have been feeling a growing unease about travelling to the United States. I fear the current unrest will escalate into violence and I don’t want to be there when it does. It’s about more than fear for my safety, though. As a Canadian, I can’t justify travelling to a country whose leader has repeatedly belittled, insulted, and made threats toward my country.

But as someone who honours my commitments, I didn’t want to let my colleagues down. What to do? What to do?

Looking for a sign

Until this week, I remember only one time when I felt I’d received a divine message. Fourteen years ago, a voice in my head ultimately led to my breast cancer diagnosis. But as I pondered my decision this week, a series of interconnected events provided signs that I just couldn’t ignore.

It started on Sunday when the gospel reading at church was from the sermon on the mount, also known as The Beatitudes (Matthew 5, 3-12). It’s an important passage because it extols virtues that true Christians (not the “in-name-only” Christians that get too much press these days) take to heart: being peacemakers, showing mercy to others, being meek and humble, and seeking justice.

Then on Monday morning, when I opened my Daily Gratitude devotional, the reflection was from the Beatitudes. In fact, the reflection for every day this week has been a verse from the Beatitudes.

Interestingly, when I chose Sunday’s music for our choir, I found a beautiful hymn called Lead Me Lord written by John Becker—and it’s based on the Beatitudes. We learned it and sang it for the first time on Sunday. Thanks to the Gospel reading and the daily devotionals, that song kept popping into my head all week.

The final piece of the puzzle dropped in my lap when I opened my devotional on Friday morning. It hit me like a thunderbolt. Here are a couple of excerpts:

Thank you for those who seek righteousness, for those who want to see a just world. … Thank you for those who speak for the voiceless and disadvantaged, spending their time, money, and talent in fighting against oppression and injustice.

Daily Gratitude, Publications International, Ltd.

Taking a stand

When I read Friday’s entry in my devotional, the reason I’d been feeling so unsettled became clear. How can I, in good conscience, travel to a country run by a fascist dictator whose behaviours and actions go against everything I value?

I decided that taking a stand against injustice and the US President’s treatment of the voiceless and disadvantaged in the United States and around the world needed to win out over my desire to see my friends and escape the cold.  

So, I shared my concerns with the meeting organizer, and she agreed that I can attend the meeting virtually. It was such a relief. I will miss seeing my friends and colleagues, but I know they will understand.

Choosing not to travel to the United States is just one way I’m taking a stand. Here are other things I’m doing.

• Buying products made in Canada or in other countries around the world.
• Refusing to support large US corporations, especially those that are cancelling their DEI programs.
• Saying no to Elon Musk by cancelling my Twitter account.
• Above all, I’m not staying quiet!

I realize I’m just one person and my efforts are but a drop in the ocean. But if 40 million Canadians join together, it will make a difference. We need to send a clear message that hatred, fascism and oppression will not win!

Humanity is better than this.

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Three highlights of the week

It’s important to celebrate big milestones and simple pleasures in life. Keeping the trend going, here are three highlights of the week gone by:

• Team Canada beat Team USA in the 4-Nations Cup championship game. In light of current events, what a sweet feeling that was!
• Inspired by a recent episode of the Sharing the Heart of the Matter podcast, I made crockpot lasagna for the first time. I found a vegetarian recipe on Pinterest. It was delicious.
• My mum turned 92 on Monday. Unfortunately, last weekend’s monster snowstorm meant we had to postpone her birthday celebrations until this weekend.

Things I learned this week

Life is all about learning. Here are three things I learned this week:

Can it be? Is Canada getting high speed rail?

I’ve written before about my dismay over our pitiful train service in Canada. High speed rail service in the Windsor to Quebec City corridor is a no-brainer considering close to half of our country’s population live in that corridor.

This week, the federal government announced plans to build Alto, an electric high-speed rail service between Toronto and Quebec City. It’s great news, although I fear that the $80 billion price tag will be an easy target if we elect a conservative government in our next election.

(Source: The Peak)

Resources to help you buy Canadian

For my fellow Canadians who are serious about joining me in taking a stand against the US government policies, here are some resources to help you buy Canadian:

• Download the Shop Canadian or O SCANada apps that will let you scan product bar codes to find out their country of origin. I tried them both and prefer Shop Canadian because it didn’t have annoying ads popping up after every scan.
• Check out the Made in CA website – A directory of hundreds of Canadian companies.

Cleaning the world with hotel soap scraps

I travel with my own soap because I hate the idea of using a bar of hotel soap once or twice and then throwing it away. Clean the World is an organization that collects and repurposes soap scraps, and donates them to communities in need. To date, those scraps have added up to 87 million bars of soap.

(Source: The Carbon Almanac)

This week’s simple living challenge – Automate bill payments

Simplifying life is a big part of living more intentionally. With that in mind, I kicked off the year with 52 ways to simplify your life this year, including a downloadable checklist of weekly tasks.

This week’s challenge is to automate your bill payments as much as possible. It will save you time every month, and eliminate the risk of late payment charges. And if you use your credit card, you’ll win with loyalty points—if you pay your credit card balance in full every month.

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I’d love to hear what you think about any of this week’s topics. Drop me a comment below and let me know your thoughts and ideas.