Tag Archives: ANiC

Freebie Friday at St. Hilda's

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A baby girl was baptised at St. Hilda’s ANiC this morning. Her mother is a young Christian woman who has been attending St. Hilda’s during the last year or so. A little less than ten years ago, every Friday lunchtime she used to walk from the high-school she attended to St. Hilda’s building for a free lunch at Freebie Friday. Part of the free lunch is a short talk on the Gospel by St. Hilda’s Pastor Paul; seeds sometimes fall on fertile ground, take root and grow, resulting in a saved sinner and great joy in heaven. The student who used to come for free lunches is now a fine young Christian who has baptised her baby and brought other Freebie Friday alumni to Sunday worship.

The last court ruling on the dispute between the Diocese of Niagara and St. Hilda’s ANiC, was that – until final ownership of the building is settled – the building must be shared between the diocese and St. Hilda’s. The diocese was given the Sunday morning time slot, so St. Hilda’s is meeting in a school gymnasium for Sunday worship. But St. Hilda’s ANiC is still present in the church building during the week and, for the moment, Freebie Friday continues.

Freebie Friday began just over ten years ago. St. Hilda’s building is located close to a high-school; every lunchtime there was a steady trickle of children past the church on their way to the mall. We wanted to try and convey to the children the idea of the free gift of salvation that Jesus offers us as the result of his atoning death on the cross: just as salvation is free, so is lunch.

The lunch is run and paid for by volunteers from St. Hilda’s and it quickly became popular: there are two sittings which attract about a hundred children every Friday. The principal of the high school regularly expresses his gratitude for this ministry.

The children sponsor two World Vision kids with their own money and buy yearly Christmas gifts for them. Recently they paid for three wheelchairs for the Free Wheelchair Mission, an organisation that provides wheelchairs as a gift of mobility for the physically disabled poor in developing countries.

Which brings me to the reason why we are fighting in the courts to keep our building. The diocese of Niagara has a congregation of about five people using St. Hilda’s building; it is managed by two priests. If they win ownership of the building, Freebie Friday, along with other ministries will stop. St. Hilda’s ANiC would not be able to continue it because it has to take place at a location close to the school; the diocese will not continue it because, even if they had the inclination, they do not have the people needed to keep the building open, let alone engage in time consuming ministries. Even their own priests admit that their congregation is not viable.

If the diocese wins the court battle for the building, after a decent interval it will be sold and bulldozed; God’s work in that place will cease.

This is why we fight.

There are still some Canadian Anglicans with guts

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God bless: St George’s, Ottawa; Church of St Peter, Hamilton; St. Aidan’s, Windsor.

These courageous parishes have chosen to join the Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC). That means they have set truth above the cultural nicety of belonging to the Anglican Church of Canada’s social club – whose main interests consist of bazaar sodality and an old-boy fraternity of priestly misfits.

These parishes know that the local ACoC goon squad will soon descend, dressed in black, to demand keys, deliver court appearance schedules and generally make life miserable, all in the name of diversity. But that won’t matter because the battle is the Lord’s and it is already won.

Update (Oct 23): Let’s add St Bede’s Anglican Church in Kinosota, Manitoba to that list. They joined ANiC on Octber 15th.

The Diocese of Niagara: A tale of hypocrisy and lies.

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On February 17th 2008 St. Hilda’s Anglican Church, Oakville held a vestry meeting to consider a proposal to join the Anglican Network in Canada. The vote was unanimously in favour with 1 abstention. A lot has happened since then and I thought it might be interesting to chronicle the story so far.

Immediately after the vote our pastor, Paul Charbonneau, was suspended with pay and was inhibited from ministering in the Anglican Church of Canada; shortly after, he was fired. The diocese relieved the wardens of their duties, installed a parish administrator working on behalf of the diocese and froze St. Hilda’s bank account. They attempted to take St. Hilda’s to court on Friday February 29th – clearly this move was prepared ahead of time – but, through the efforts of our legal team we were given a week of grace.

We circulated the details of our plight to all the Oakville Anglican churches in the hope of mustering some support; there were few responses, but this one from Dan Tatarnic, Assistant Curate, St. Christopher’s Church, Burlington is representative: “Dan Tatarnic here, keep your opinion to yourself, it is not worth two cents.”.  Thanks Dan.

On Sunday February 24th, the diocese held a service in St. Hilda’s building as a political statement; outsiders were invited to attend to swell the numbers which would otherwise have been close to zero. The resultant travesty is chronicled here. After this, we had our usual service . As a particularly pastorally sensitive gesture, the priest in charge for the diocesan service inflicted this on his unsuspecting victims.

On February 29th, the court ruling was that St. Hilda’s was to be given exclusive use of its building – temporarily.

On March 20th We were back in court – this time with a different judge – and the ruling handed down on May the 5th was that St. Hilda’s and the diocese had to share the building;  the diocese was given a time slot on Sundays that made it impossible for St. Hilda’s to worship in the building. We decided to conduct our Sunday worship at a local school; the first Sunday at the school was Pentecost 2008, a date that symbolised a new beginning. The diocesan service had a disappointing turnout: here is the parking lot. And here are some pictures from the real St. Hilda’s.

Since then, the diocesan service each Sunday has had no-one attending its service other than the priest, his wife and the person who sets up the altar. In an abundance of trivial irritations, it is hard to choose one to represent them all, nevertheless: the ‘priest in charge’ at St. Hilda’s (the diocesan euphemism for ‘stooge’), Brian Ruttan asked us to return the communion vessels and linen – much of which was donated or handmade by parishioners – so that he could use them for his congregation of zero. We returned them and are using plain replacements; interestingly enough, the plain replacements have acquired a special value.

In a spirit of reconciliation and to reduce court costs, St. Hilda’s has approached the diocese to settle the dispute outside the courts with an arbitrator; this has been rebuffed by the diocese who want things to be settled by the courts ‘in public’.

As of this writing (September 2008), the diocese is still holding empty services in St. Hilda’s building each Sunday and still refusing to negotiate. Which brings us to the question of why does each side of this issue want the building? St. Hilda’s wants it for ministry, including:

  • Food Drive: Food for Life Canada, together with Kerr Street Market and St. Hilda’s Church, run an outreach program for people in need in the Hopedale area.
  • “Cloz for Moz” Project: An outreach to Mozambique which delivered crates of nearly new clothes and blankets to this area of need in Africa
  • Garage Sale “Giveaway”: We have a community Garage Sale, but the items are Free! An illustration of God’s love for us.
  • Free Car Wash: We offer free car washes to passers by as an illustration of the love of Jesus.
  • Power and Light: A junior youth group where kids from the church and community meet Friday evenings for Fun and Games!
  • Freebie Friday: Freebie Friday is a drop-in for the students of Blakelock High School, which is located just a few doors away. Each Friday during the school year, St. Hilda’s Parish Hall is open from 11:00 am – 1:30 pm for the students to drop by during their lunch hour to have lunch, play games, talk to a volunteer or to go into the church to pray. We usually get more than 100 kids.
  • Artists for Africa: A fund raiser by St. Hilda’s artists to help alleviate poverty in Africa.
  • Alpha: Members of the community are invited to find out more about Christianity
  • Marriage Alpha: A marriage course open to members of the community.

Why does the Diocese of Niagara want it? Because the land it sits on is worth around a couple of million dollars.

The truth is out there

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On July 31st the Diocese of Niagara – who are suing the pants off parishes that voted to join ANiC – agreed to a debate with ANiC on the Michael Coren show.

The Rev. Lynn Corfield from the diocese offers her impressions of the Michael Coren ANiC Diocese of Niagara debate

I have extracted a few choice morsels for your delectation:

In July I had an invitation from The Very Rev’d Peter Wall to join him in a panel discussion on the topic “The Future of the Anglican Church.” Peter explained that the conversation was to be with two members of the Anglican Network of Canada and was for the Michael Coren Show. We would be taped and then later that day (July 31st) it would be broadcast on Vision TV. The invitation came in the midst of my sabbatical leave and I was somewhat out of touch with recent developments, but I said yes!

…

Basically it went well. But It felt like Peter Wall and I didn’t get much ‘air’ time in compared to the views of the ANC..

Translation: we were not allowed to bring up the ‘homophobia’ word.

Michael did say that one hour is not enough and that we could only scratch the surface of the topic – and I can agree with him. It was said several times by Paula and Ray that the Bible is black and white on the issue of homosexuality and this is simply not up for negotiation. In my view the Bible is the living Word of God; it has a heart that beats passionately into each new generation. It was frustrating to hear the same arguments that I and other people who believe in the blessing of same sex unions do not understand the Bible, nor the canons of the Anglican Church.

Stripped of the flowery ‘beating heart’ metaphor, what we are left with is Humpty Dumpty in Alice Through The Looking Glass: `When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, `it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’

What is at stake is how we treat people who are different in some way from ourselves. The Anglican Network in Canada – feel that they are starting a new church which expresses the true tenants (sic), formularies and tradition of the Anglican Church.

ANiC starting a new church? 70% of the world’s Anglicans are saying that TEC and the ACoC are the ones who have started a new church; you need to listen to the beating heart of Anglicanism, Lynn.

c/p Essentials blog