Oh Leonard, sweet poet, sweet priest, thanks for teaching me how to find reverence in an irreverent age; thanks for teaching me how to slow down and take the world seriously; and thanks for teaching me how to take off my shoes and remember, that this place, the place where you are, is always sacred ground.
Oh Leonard, sweet poet, sweet priest, nothing has ever summarized the heart of your message for me more than this passage from The Book of Exodus: “God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.”
Oh Leonard, sweet poet, sweet priest, you didn’t visit the golden cities of our Judaeo-Christian past like a tourist; you strolled their streets, at a leisurely pace, with the telltale swagger of a homeboy; and you touched so many perfect bodies with your mind.
—John Faithful Hamer, From Here: A Love Letter to Montréal (2017)
Committing Sociology 