Responses from Parishioners at St. Paul’s Anglican Church Golden, British Columbia!

My prayer for the Anglican Church of Canada in 2019 is

• That the church will either marry gay and lesbian couples or get out of the marriage business altogether and bless civil unions.
• One Church under God, with Our Lord Jesus Christ reigning on Earth in Jerusalem.
• Is still in existence
• That the church will shine as a place of love and inclusiveness and will preach and act for love, justice and peace.
• That it is vibrant, alive and influencial in the broader community. More people …. young and old, families also. Mostly, that the joy that is experienced with faith is obvious and abundant!
• That we have a beautiful full congregation full of enjoymnet for all who attend: young and old.
• Financially stable
• Following radical charge of the Sprit- guiding us in ways we could never imagine.
• Challenge!
• For continued love and help to all.
• That Christ will have come; that his thousand year reign will have begun.
• I pray that the Anglican Church preaches the Gospel in Canada and the world. In Christ Jesus name. Amen.
• A large enough congregation to be financially self-sustaining.
• That we will build a happier and healthier community within the church and build a closer family.
• I pray that we shall have accord among all parts of the Anglican Communion, allowing us to go ahead in our mission to serve Christ in this world.
• I pray that we will continue to serve our communities, our country and the world in the guiding and guarding light of Christ and continue to discern Jesus’ radical call with integrity, humility and gracious love.

I am a female Anglican priest living in Sorrento, B. C. I served in the Diocese of Keewatin, where I was ordained, and then in the Diocese of Kootenay.  I retired to Sorrento 5 years ago.  Since coming to Sorrento I have done some interim work and help out in Kootenay and in APCI.  The main work I have done in my time in Sorrento is at Sorrento Centre.  This is an Anglican Retreat and Conference Centre.  It is a great place to work or volunteer as there is always cutting edge Anglican learning happening.  Change is the main happening at Sorrento Centre!  As a result it is hard to attend the main stream parish church on Sunday where inclusive language is frowned upon and music is 500 years old.

So – to your questions. Where is my church now?  By “my church”I mean the Anglican Church of Canada.

My church is lost in childish arguments and tantrums, in upholstering the pews, in excluding those who are different, in protecting the status quo.  The male bishops of the church have no clue what it is like to be a woman, either lay or ordained, in the church today. They are afraid of change, of losing their power and of letting the Gospel of love lose in the world.  I weep for the church which is so far from where Jesus calls us to be.

I have little hope that there will be any change by 2019. I`m not sure the church will survive.  However, if there is a miracle and the church will allow change, perhaps some of the following will happen.

People will read the bible and have a real working knowledge of scripture.  That includes children who will be welcomed with deep love and sincerety into worship services.

All people will be welcomed into our church. Gay and lesbian folks will be blessed and married in our church.  There will be no issues around women as incumbent priests or as diocesan bishops.

We will truly care about the poor, the hungry and the  homeless.  We will consider our first work to care for the marginalized people in our society.  All churches will have made the necessary changes for disabled people to come to worship and be part of the church community.

We will be a church that forgives easily and quickly.  We will respect every human being and treat them carefully and gently.

We will simplify our church buildings.  Get rid of the buildings that drag us down and use up our resources.  We don`t need them.

Every single member will  have a real ministry and be enabled and encouraged to fulfil it.

I have little hope that any of this will happen.

Vision 2019: Where I See Our Church in Ten Years’ Time.

Without a past there is no future. Our collective amnesia is one of the great threats to the church and to society as a whole. In order to envisage the future, we need to remember where we have come from. Canadian society has rapidly evolved from British colony to a multicultural society, widely regarded as one of the most successful in the world. Our church has also evolved rapidly. Until 1949 the Church of England in Canada, as we were then known, was still dependent on grants from the United Kingdom. Unlike the Episcopal Church in the United States, which was forced to stand on its own feet from 1776 on, Canadian Anglicans inherited a notion of ‘established church’, and with it the erroneous belief that somehow the state would finance it.  Part of our history included the Upper Canadian vision that we should be established – out of which grew the battles between Strachan and Ryerson. In Quebec, of course, which until 1960 had two established churches (Roman Catholicism for the French-Canadians and a privileged Anglicanism for the English minority which controlled most of the financial institutions), the situation was somewhat different; but there was a widespread assumption that if you didn’t have an Anglo-Saxon name and white skin (unless you were an evangelised First Nations person) you couldn’t possibly be Anglican! It was not until 1955 that we changed our name (out of a growing recognition that it was a barrier to non-English immigrants and French-Canadians) from “Church of England in Canada” to “The Anglican Church of Canada/Ēglise Anglicane du Canada”. This was coupled with a desire to have a Canadian Book of Common Prayer to replace the 1662 version then in use. The first draft book of 1955 was deemed a bit too Catholic for what was still a largely Orange church. In 1959 a slightly revised book was unanimously approved by General Synod. It represented in many ways the end of the old hostilities between “High” and “Low” Anglicans. After the required approval by another General Synod in 1962 it became the official Canadian Book of Common Prayer.  Already, however, we were into the sixties, and the winds of change were blowing. Almost immediately there were requests for more contemporary liturgies, and twenty years of “experimental liturgy” led to the 1985 Book of Alternative Services. (more…)

Filmed at the recent Council of General Synod meeting in Mississauga, Ont.