One comes across interesting snippets when browsing old newspapers. The following is taken from the Qu’Appelle Didette, Thursday February 7^th, 1889:

The Ritualistic movement in the neighbouring Anglican diocese of Niagara has led to the formation of an association for adherence to evangelicalism. Hartley, Carmichael and several clergymen waited upon the Bishop of Niagara and declared the introduction of ritualistic practices to be repugnant to the majority of the members of the diocese.

It was a valiant effort by Hartley and Carmichael but it didn’t last: today in the Diocese of Niagara there is little left but “ritualistic practices”. “Adherence to evangelicalism” has all but been stamped out by the concerted efforts of Bothwell, Spence and Bird and the only thing that is repugnant to the diocese is the Gospel.

I came across a youtube curiosity this evening. It is a video of one of the Potemkin congregations that have occupied St. Hilda’s Anglican Church in Oakville over the last couple of years. These particular squatters and their kakistocrat, Martha Tatarnic were imported from St. Jude’s, Oakville. The video was taken in December 2008 shortly before Martha left for Orillia to share a church with some Lutherans. All the interlopers have also returned to their own parish now, along with their dreadful piano. I note the influence of Leni Riefenstahl in the camera work.

I don’t normally pick on individual Anglican parishes however severe the temptation, but in the case of St. Aidan’s, Oakville I am going to make an exception because its rector, Cheryl Fricker, was one of four rectors who attempted to set up a Potemkin parish at St. Hilda’s by staging weekly sit-ins with some of her congregation – well, also because I feel like it.

St. Aidan’s newsletter, the Messenger is a wonderful example of the church as Social Club, a place where the petite bourgeoisie of one of the wealthiest towns in Canada can play-act at embracing those in need (in the nicest possible way), being a community hub and partnering with others. As the Messenger reveals, at St. Aidan’s one can find everything from the aesthetic in the grant-funded Arthouse, to the environmental in pious green sustainability advice, to pop psychology in the Self-Esteem Support Group.

One article in particular caught my attention: Reaching Out by Ann Wood. In the article, Anne extols the virtues of a welcoming church:

Then we added a picture. It shows the congregation heading into the church as the bell rings for the morning service. There we are, walking up the path and shortcutting across the lawn, families, couples, singles, older, teens, and small kids tossing the fall leaves. The Minister is holding the door open. “That’s us,” the picture says, “We’re going into our church, come on in!”

It sounds all very cosy and would by an entirely unremarkable description were it not for the fact that Ann Wood – whom I affectionately think of as Nora Batty – is the notorious Diocese of Niagara Bouncer who marched me out of St. Hilda’s on Easter Day in 2009. I think I might have to join the Self-Esteem Support Group.

As a peon in numerous large companies over the years, I have collected little sayings that served as comforting aphorisms while I drifted from one hegemony to the next. One referred to senior managers and it was, “same circus, different clowns” and another was to consider oneself a mushroom: we were kept in the dark and copious quantities of manure descended from above.

For the Diocese of Niagara, the parishioners are its mushrooms. The fact that diocesan leaders have largely abandoned Christianity for a concoction of Gaia worship, Unitarianism and pantheism is disguised by the well practised waffling evasion of its priests and bishop.

Almost as bad, is the fact that the average parishioner has no idea that diocesan assets accumulated through offerings are being used to pay lawyers to throw fellow Christians out of the buildings they paid for.

In this vein, the latest diocesan budget intones:

We have not projected any investment return for 2010 as we anticipate these funds will be required to finance our ongoing cashflow needs as well as having offset operating losses for 2007 and 2008, in addition to funding the expenses related to the breakaway parishes.

The only real expenses that relate to the “breakaway parishes” are the considerable sums charged by the diocese’s lawyer – over $320,000 so far. The actual amount is absent from the budget as is any explanation of where it is really coming from: Niagara parishioners, it is coming from your pockets. It’s time the mushrooms woke up.

For the most part, the Diocese of Niagara no longer believes the gospel: its priests don’t believe the creeds, that the bible is the inspired word of God, in the virgin birth, the substitutionary atonement of Christ or his physical resurrection. Unsurprisingly, Christians are fleeing the diocese.

The editor of the Niagara Anglican, Christopher Grabiec, ever intent on keeping a firm grip on his blinkers, does not see the obvious connection between a benighted theology and mass exodus. Instead, it is a time of testing, even a dark night of the soul.

The corrective action suggested by Mr. Grabiec is to more thoroughly abandon historic creeds and orthodox Christian beliefs (page 1):

It’s time to hang up our past prejudices and our insistence on things being the way they were. Christ, born among us, entered a world that was smug and sure of itself and its religious systems. He turned over their tables. Who is to say that our systems, our creeds, our beliefs as we understand them, are for all time? Our chosen bishop and spiritual leader has asked us to look at everything and to grow in Christ, pursing excellence as a community and as ministers of Christ in the world.

As the 4 Niagara ANiC parishes brace themselves for the next legal onslaught from a diocesan administration bent on exacting revenge for the affront of being told they have abandoned the Christian religion, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that the predicament of Christopher Grabiec and his master is a contemporary exposition of Exodus 4:21.

But only one, and it has a capital “S”. Here is Archdeacon Michael Patterson to explain:

The idea that poverty – and little else – is a “Sin” is attractive to liberal Anglicans because one bears no direct personal responsibility for it, and thus its remedy is in the hands of government not the individual.

The Diocese of Niagara and ANiC have come to a new “sharing” agreement for the three ANiC parishes that were taken to court by the diocese in 2008: the diocese gets exclusive use of St. George’s and ANiC gets exclusive use of St. Hilda’s and Good Shepherd until the building ownership is finally settled. And the diocese has to start paying its bills – finally, maybe…. the cheque’s in the mail.

The court ruling of May 2008 stated that ANiC and the Diocese of Niagara had to share the three buildings; each had a timeslot to conduct a service. The diocese advertised healing and rebuilding services:

We are grateful and give thanks that Anglican Church of Canada, Diocese of Niagara, services will resume at the parish churches of St. George’s, Lowville, St. Hilda’s, Oakville, and The Church of the Good Shepherd, St. Catharines.

“These are services of healing and rebuilding and we hope will be attended by returning and continuing parishioners.” We hope that all who wish to worship in an Anglican Church of Canada, Diocese of Niagara service will feel welcome.

There wasn’t much healing or rebuilding since there was no congregation at all at St. Hilda’s, a very small congregation in Good Shepherd – which was non-viable in the opinion of its priest in charge – and a small congregation in St. George’s.

It seems that the diocese has abandoned the fantasy of rebuilding congregations in Oakville and St. Catherines; unfortunately the diocesan leadership has not abandoned its intention of seizing the buildings:

We are now anticipating moving this legal case forward here in Niagara and to have this matter settled so that we may continue in our mission and ministry.

If the diocese eventually wins the battle over the ANiC buildings, the mission and ministry will primarily involve bulldozers, since the properties will be sold to provide cash to bolster a financially troubled diocese, pay the expensive diocesan lawyers and keep the diocesan leadership employed.