Interview with The Rev. Amanda Currie about the Canadian Council of Churches
Summary:
In this episode of the Ministry Forum Podcast, Rev. John Borthwick sits down with Rev. Amanda Currie, former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Canada and current President of the Canadian Council of Churches. They explore the significance of ecumenism, the role of the CCC in fostering unity among diverse Christian traditions, and how churches can work together despite theological and historical differences. Amanda shares her personal journey of living out ecumenism daily, reflections on church unity, and insights into what the future of the Christian church might look like. Whether you're passionate about interchurch collaboration or just curious about how denominations navigate their differences, this episode offers a thoughtful and inspiring conversation.
Quotables:
“One of the things that's pretty distinctive about the Canadian Council of Churches is that we have a forum method of decision making, and so it means that we don't vote very often. We use consensus decision making on almost everything that we do” - Amanda Currie
“But what an opportunity to celebrate the resurrection. I mean, we do every year, we do every Sunday. Why not a really big one for 2000 years? And so that seems like a really exciting possibility, bringing together evangelicals and mainline Christians across the spectrum, to be able to celebrate that piece of our faith that is so foundational that very much brings us together.” - Amanda Currie
“So I guess I want to say that the Canadian Council of Churches is this big, diverse network, really, and there are a lot of Presbyterians that are involved in it, like I may have this president title, but that we have people from across our denomination, from across the country, lay people and clergy who have expertise and interest in a whole variety of these topics. And they're at all those tables, and they're making really important contributions to all of those conversations which lead to greater unity, which lead to common action, common witness, all of those things. I feel very privileged to be part of that, but recognize that we have some really, really great people from our denomination that are engaged in a whole variety of ways.” - Amanda Currie
“And sometimes we think of that when we gather for worship and we experience liturgies of different churches, and we say, I maybe don't want to worship in that particular way on a regular basis, but it's a beautiful offering. And isn't it beautiful that I can join in that?” - Amanda Currie
“But I think that the CCC embodies unity by being at the tables together, by being in the conversation, by being committed to come together, even though there are really hard issues that continue to separate us. So it's that determination to be together, even when there's difference, even when some of those things, we don't know how they're going to get worked out maybe one day, but it seems like a far off thing, but to be able to gather together and pray and worship and to to stay in the conversation, to stay in the relationship, and to build the relationship even when, when there may be something that someone would say, Well, I can't even talk to that person, because they maybe, you know, they believe these things, and they're just so, so different from what I believe. I don't even want to be there. But people who come to those tables say I want to be there, even though we're not there yet. There's a level of respect for one another that I have experienced within the CCC that gives me such confidence and joy that there is a possibility for agreement down the road. Certainly as an ordained woman, interacting with many leaders from different traditions, where that's not a thing, and yet, the respect and collegiality that I experience in those spaces is amazing despite those differences.” - Amanda Currie
“as Presbyterians, there is this sense that when we come together and we talk and we pray and we even debate and we like but we're when we're at the table in the courts of the church, we believe that the Holy Spirit does guide us. We believe that this Holy Spirit can guide us together towards something, towards something that God is calling us to. And it's a big leap of faith to say, like the Spirit's going keep on working.” - Amanda Currie
“I don't think the future of the church is one without denominations, although maybe it won't be the word denominations. I do think that there is great value in the healthy diversity, the diversity that doesn't need to divide us from one another.” - Amanda Currie
About The Rev. Amanda Currie
The Rev. Amanda Currie is a graduate of Knox College (M.Div. 2003) who is serving as the Minister at First Presbyterian Church in Regina. Amanda has a heart for ecumenism, partly due to the fact that she's married to a Roman Catholic theologian. During her extended term as Moderator of the General Assembly (2019-2021) she preached, wrote, and shared a lot about ecumenism and interchurch families. In addition to her congregational ministry, Amanda now serves as the President of The Canadian Council of Churches (2024-2027).
Additional Resources:
The Canadian Council of Churches
Eight Days of Prayer Bible Study
Week of Prayer for Christian Unity 2025 - CCC Resource Page
World Alliance of Reformed Churches
Evangelical Fellowship of Canada
JC2033 - Celebration of 2000th Anniversary of Christ's Resurrection
The Presbyterian Church in Canada's Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations Committee
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Transcript
[Introduction]
Welcome. Welcome to the Ministry Forum Podcast coming to you from the Center for Lifelong Learning at Knox College, where we connect, encourage and resource ministry leaders all across Canada as they seek to thrive in their passion to share the gospel.
I am your host, the Reverend John Borthwick, Director of the Center and curator of all that is ministryforum.ca. I absolutely love that I get to do what I get to do, and most of all that, I get to share it all with all of you. So thanks for taking the time out of your day to give us a listen. Whether you're a seasoned ministry leader or just beginning your journey, this podcast is made with you in mind.
[John Borthwick]
We're talking ecumenism today on the Ministry Forum Podcast, and I'm delighted to have in studio, The Reverend Amanda Currie, former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Canada. Fun fact, only moderator to serve multiple years, friend of ministry, forum and minister at First Presbyterian Church in Regina, Saskatchewan. Her list of accomplishments and responsibilities is likely too fulsome to detail on this episode, but for today, we're going to focus on one particular passion of hers, ecumenism. Amanda currently serves as the president of the Canadian Council of Churches. The CCC. For those who don't know, the Canadian Council of Churches was formed in 1944 and its mission is to respond to Christ's call for unity and peace. Seek Christ's truth with affection for diversity and act in love through prayer, dialogue and witness to the gospel. It is a broad and inclusive ecumenical body now representing 26 member churches, including Anglican, Eastern and Roman Catholic, Evangelical, Free Church, Eastern and Oriental, Orthodox and historical Protestant traditions. Together, these member churches comprise 85% of the Christians in Canada. We're going to dive in with Amanda as to how the CCC lives out its mission, how 26 member churches come to any unity at all when it can be challenging enough in one's own denomination. And what the future of ecumenism looks like from the president of the CCCs perspective, Amanda, welcome. It's so great to have you on the Ministry Forum Podcast.
[Amanda Currie]
Thank you very much for having me, John.
[John Borthwick]
Well, let's start
with a little bit more about you. I've given some broad brush strokes about who you are and everything else, but maybe you could fill in the fine details. Is there anything else you'd like to say about your experience, or, perhaps more specifically, what has led you to become the president of the Canadian Council of Churches?
[Amanda Currie]
Well, to start off, I liked your introduction and the various things that you included there, and one of the things I liked was friend of Ministry Forum. I think that's a good title. It's been great to be part of the things that Ministry Forum has been doing over the last year and a little bit past a year, and particularly having served in Saskatchewan, I've been serving as a congregational minister in Saskatchewan for 21 years, and sometimes we feel a little bit isolated out here. There's not very many of us in our two tiny presbyteries, and so Ministry Forum has added another layer of a really great way to connect across the church and to receive some great resources and that sort of thing. So it's good to be a friend of Ministry Forum, but to see a little bit more about me, I have to say first of all, well, I have this title now of President of the Canadian Council of Churches for about three years, I will have it, that'll be in this role, probably first and foremost, I am a pastor of a Presbyterian congregation, and that's what I have been doing for the last 21 years, the last seven and a half of those settled here in Regina.
And there's lots of things in my ministry life to keep me busy. For example, we just celebrated our 100th anniversary as a congregation just a week or so ago, and had some really great celebrations as part of that. I love preaching and teaching and doing pastoral care. I really enjoy preparing good worship with diverse music. Music is a great passion of mine as well. And right now, over the last year or so, we've been doing a lot of exploration with intergenerational worship and thinking about how our kids are really engaged in the worship that we do together.
But you're right that ecumenism is a particular passion of mine. And if I started at the beginning of where ecumenism became a passion of mine, I could go back to when I was a child and I had friends who belonged to different churches, and I remember going to different churches with my friends, both in elementary school and in high school, and having little experiences of what other churches than the Presbyterian Church in Canada were like. But the big thing that happened was actually when I went went to Knox College, and I was a student doing my Master of Divinity at Knox College, and I happened to meet another student who was one from one of the Catholic colleges, and about a year later, we got married, and my husband is Nicholas Jessen, and he is a Roman Catholic ecumenist and theologian. So he not only brought, you know, the experience of people from two different Christian traditions, but he also brought a passion for ecumenism, which I was able to easily catch as well. He was the former director of the Prairie Center for ecumenism in Saskatoon, and he's worked in a variety of roles. Right now, he is the ecumenical and interfaith officer for the Archdiocese of Regina, so he works with the bishop here in Regina, equipping the Catholic parishes in terms of how they work together in ecumenism with their neighbors, as well as being kind of a hub of communications for all the churches in Regina and to a degree across Saskatchewan, of keeping churches connected with each other and doing ecumenical education and that kind of thing.
So he was always passionate about ecumenism and I became passionate about ecumenism of well, not just because he thought it was a good thing, but also because of the experience that we had in becoming a family, becoming a couple, married to one another, with our two traditions coming along with us. So there's lots of different options when you marry someone from a different denomination, and some of those involve, kind of you just do your own thing. Everybody, each person goes to their own place on Sunday morning and does their own thing, and maybe you talk about it afterwards, or whatever. Or sometimes in families, there's the challenge that, you know, it's hard to manage, manage two places of worship and two places of service and involvement in two communities, and so somebody either ends up switching, joining the other happens lots of the time, or somebody kind of drops out and you don't, or maybe even both partners drop out because you can't quite figure out what that looks like. The model that Nick and I chose was what's called being an interchurch couple or an interchurch family, which means that we keep both our traditions, we participate in both our traditions. But not only I participate in my Presbyterian Church, but Nick participates too. So he's here every Sunday morning. I'm sitting right now in my office at the church, and he is an active participant in our church community in a variety of ways. But also I participate in his so it just does make for a busy life. We're very, I guess, religious people. We go to church a lot, but it means that I spend lots and lots of time in the Catholic Church as well, and over the years, I've done different things, like reading scripture or singing in the choir or assisting with different things, you know. So bring whatever gifts to whatever capacity I have, because I have a lot of responsibilities in my own church as well. But I think that's really where I caught the passion for ecumenism when I came to know another church tradition that's not my own, but came to be a part of the community and love the people, and grew in love recognizing the gifts that the Catholic Church has to offer, the things that I might have some trouble with as well, and also to see through different eyes, the gifts of my church, from someone who has come into being a part of the Presbyterian Church, seeing both the gifts and the things that maybe aren't quite as they should be, you know, recognizing we've all got a long way to go. And so that's a big part of that ecumenical journey for me.
[John Borthwick]
That's amazing. You basically live ecumenism every single day, yeah, in your day to day living, that's amazing. And when I was at your church a while back, I believe Nick was doing the tech stuff, the tech direction in the service that day. That's amazing. Yeah
[Amanda Currie]
He's fortunate to have some other people working with him on that, but he is sort of the key person who helped us keep going through the pandemic with going, okay, really simple tech ways of live streaming on from a cell phone, and then got us set up and we slowly, you know, we have cameras and YouTube, right? All the stuff. Now, that's one of the gifts he brings to our church.
[John Borthwick]
That's wonderful.
[Amanda Currie]
Indeed. As I kept going with this ecumenical journey. Then it wasn't, it wasn't just about my family or just about Nick's particular passion and experience with ecumenism, but I began years ago when I was in my first call in Saskatoon to get involved in the ecumenical networks that were in that city. And that is a remarkably ecumenical in Saskatoon with the Prairie Center for Ecumenism. And so I started being involved in Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. We had a downtown ecumenical network in the city where we worked together, particularly around issues of poverty and homelessness and justice kind of related stuff. But also I became a Presbyterian representative on the board of the Prairie Center for Ecumenism, and started to take leadership roles in that.
It was after that that I got as I was sort of just going further with that, I was invited to become a member of the ecumenical and interfaith relations committee of the Presbyterian Church in Canada. And so that was a really good experience to be on a national committee and starting to think about how the PCC engages in the world of ecumenism with our neighbors, not just on a local level, but also at a national level. And it was through that that I initially got exposed to the Canadian Council of Churches. So once I became the convener of that committee, then I was the person who got to go as one of the Presbyterian representatives to the governing board of the Canadian Council of Churches. And so then it went from there. I served for, I think, about six years as a rep, and then I was elected as one of the vice presidents. There's three vice presidents. And then after that, then I was just this year, elected as the president. So that was the little journey of the process of going deeper and deeper into these things.
[John Borthwick]
And was it, was it your work on the ecumenical and interfaith relations committee. Was it that that sort of made you sort of have some face to face, face time with the Canadian Council of Churches, like curious about how you got on board?
[Amanda Currie]
Usually in the PCC, usually the convener of that committee, along with the Principal Clerk of the General Assembly, who is officially our denominations ecumenical officer. So usually it's those two people that go to the governing board meetings of the CCC. And occasionally we've had a third we can technically have have, you know, we can have so many representatives on different things. So that was my big exposure. I mean, I knew about the Canadian Council of Churches a little bit. Churches a little before that, particularly around the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. I knew that they, not only they basically, what they do is they adapt the resources that come from the international resources, which is put together by the World Council of Churches and the Vatican working together, those get produced and shared around the world, and then the Canadian Council of Churches works with those, adapts them for Canadian context to a degree, make sure that they're bilingual in Canadian English and Canadian French, and also often provides additional resources for a Canadian context. And so I had been using those resources for a number of years, and kind of seeing different things that were coming out from the Canadian Council of Churches, but not necessarily being up close and involved.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, and it's amazing how people have a journey towards those kinds of things. I remember some being asked to serve on that committee of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, and I guess I was not a successful candidate. This was a million years ago, and that's okay. In part, it was related to when I served in West Toronto, I was invited by the clerk there to apply for to be a delegate for the World Alliance of Reformed Churches when it was called the world alliance of Reformed churches. And I was successful in that, and went to Accra, Ghana for that big meeting. Wonderful. Yeah. It was an amazing experience to meet people from all over the world, from the reformed tradition. You meet bishops of Presbyterian churches and things like that.
[Amanda Currie]
Indeed, that's when you go, oh, there's reformed bishops? How interesting. My moderator trip back in 2019 was to Hungary and Romania, and they have reformed bishops in those places too, but a little different from other sorts of bishops, but definitely use that term.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah. So it definitely and the World Alliance or Reform Churches, Accra conference just is celebrating right now. I think its 20th anniversary so, or 20th year since it was then. And yeah, so it was a long time ago, but it certainly exposed me. And obviously your journey has exposed you to the wider church, and that's amazing. What does a president do? Then, what does a president of the Canadian Council of Churches spend their time doing? And how, maybe a little bit…
[Amanda Currie]
I writing some notes down of what does the President do? I haven't been at it for very long. It was only in May of 2024 so it's been less than a year that I've been in the role, and I've been learning what. President is does or is supposed to do. But in the first thing I wrote down was it's it's kind of like, it's not dissimilar to the role of being Moderator of the PCC. It's not the same role, obviously, but it's similar in that it's not my full-time job. You keep going in the ministry that you're doing in whatever place you are, and you do it as a volunteer, and you're working with people at two kind of like there's a lot of convening kind of role. So when it comes to the governing board meetings, which is the main body of the CCC, I'm the person that initially convenes those meetings, although I share the convening with three vice presidents. So the executive is always set up with to make sure that there is diversity in terms of the denominational background and the gender and other kinds of factors that would make for a diverse group. So the President isn't everything. There's a president, and then there's three VPs, and we, we take turns convening the governing board meetings and work together. But it's a lot of the convening, the conversations and listening to people and helping them go through a process.
One of the things that's pretty distinctive about the Canadian Council of Churches is that we have a forum method of decision making, and so it means that we don't vote very often. We use consensus decision making on almost everything that we do, except those occasional financial questions, where there needs to be a proper motion and a mover and a seconder. But otherwise, we come to decisions through a consensus model, where we are listening to the all the voices, naming consensus and making sure that we move forward when we're ready to move forward, but without necessarily having a vote. So there's a role for presidents and vice presidents in terms of guiding through that process on whatever the topics are that are under conversation.
So between governing board meetings, we also have executive meetings, and those sometimes happen online and sometimes in person. So I'm responsible for convening those as well. I work closely with the General Secretary of the Canadian Council of Churches, which is currently Pastor Peter Noteboom, and he's the staff he's the full time staff person. And he works with other, some full time, but mostly part time staff people within the CCC that that take care of different areas of the work. And he's really the hub of activity, but the President is kind of like a key person to connect with him, to offer him support, to make sure that that things are on track, and be that connection between the staff and the executive and the board as a whole.
Sometimes like, kind of like a PCC moderator, sometimes the President has the opportunity to speak on behalf of the CCC, but it's, it's similar in a way, you know, if you've ever paid attention to statements and things that come out from the moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, it's always a matter of being able to speak what the church has said. It's always it's always rooted in what the General Assembly, the actual governing body of the church, has approved and said in one way or shape or form. Now there may be some pastoral messages in between that that the moderator is able to say consistent with what the church has said. And similarly, if the president of the CCC ever speaks. It's supposed to be something that is consistent to what the council as a whole has agreed to or come to. And so very often, there's lots of different ways of the council speaking, and sometimes it's the General Secretary and the President saying something, and sometimes the council as a whole. And then there's a whole process of making sure that all the churches and their leaders are comfortable and on board with whatever is being said. So there is that sort of speaking role, but it's gentle and it's careful as to how it happens.
[John Borthwick]
I appreciate that. Wow. I've always wondered and assumed that when the moderator speaks, or when someone like yourself as the president of something speaks, it's always been crafted or edited, or a couple of other eyes have gone over it just to make sure that it's consistent with like you say, the messaging. Yeah, that's important. That's important.
[Amanda Currie]
That is indeed the case. I think certainly within the Presbyterian Church, as we've been, we're always very careful about the moderator not saying something that is not that is inconsistent with what the church has said. So we're not supposed to be it's not like we're the Grand Poobah of the church. We're simply the person who carries forward that that work of the General Assembly. Is the only officer of the church that continues and that kind of thing. So we're cautious about not being rooted in the personality of the one person, but rather being able to speak on behalf of the church together. So there's a similar dynamic there.
The other things that President gets to do as well is be a connecting person between the churches in more informal ways, and so we'll have occasional meetings between church leaders, which is kind of a funny term, but on the national level, church leaders include things like moderators of churches that have moderators, but as well, national bishops and things like that, people who are kind of whatever the title is in their denomination of sort of the main leader of the church. And so we'll gather together for to just to encourage those relationships to grow between the churches, not just in the formal body, but also between the individuals that have those roles to play. And will sometimes meet by zoom. And there's a tradition of once a year meeting for a retreat with those church leaders. And we usually use the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity resources and spend a couple of days together in a retreat center somewhere, building relationships, but also talking about, what are the challenges that the churches are facing and even, what are the challenges that the individuals in those difficult, challenging roles are facing together? So it's a role of trying to offer that kind of support to church leaders through the CCC as well.
[John Borthwick]
That's amazing. Wow. So speaking to that, has there been anything so far in your I guess, a little more than six months in leadership in this way that's kind of stood out to you as particularly interesting, or maybe some challenging things, or things that might be particularly meaningful in this journey? You've still got, you've still got lots of time to do some more things that are going to be exciting, but I'm just curious for anything so far.
[Amanda Currie]
In in less than a year, I made a note of a few of the things that have been really big highlights in the CCCs work. One of them is the fact that we hit our 80th anniversary, and so we've been having celebrations and honoring of that 80th anniversary of 80 years. It's pretty remarkable period of time that the churches have been working together in these kinds of ways. And we had a big fundraising campaign, which we were aimed at $650,000 to raise through the fundraising campaign. And we actually, as the year turned over into 2025 we met the goal and surpassed it by a little bit. But more than that, just that, finding that sustained sustainability, financial sustainability for the council, and in a time when financial sustainability for congregations denominations is challenging, I think the thing that really stood out to me was the fact that the churches and the people of the churches responded to that campaign so strongly, which indicates to me, a strong sense of confidence and valuing of the work that is done through the council. And there were gifts from denominations. I mean, the denominations all make payments. They all make their contributions to the CCC every year, but a lot of churches made additional ones. Affiliates, which are other Christian groups that are not so, things like Kairos and Citizens for Public Justice and some of the other ecumenical organizations, like the Canadian Center for Ecumenism in Montreal and the Prairie Center in Saskatoon. We have lots of affiliates, and many of them made, made special gifts, as well as religious orders and foundations, as well as lots of individuals who really were saying, this is important work, and we want to be part of it and support it.
Another thing that stood out to me in the last little while was not too long before Christmas, later in the fall, we have an opportunity to have a meeting between the executive of the Canadian Council of Churches and the board of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada. So I think you said in your introduction that the CCC covers like about 85% of Christians in Canada, their churches belong to the CCC. So there's obviously ones that don't, and although we do include some evangelical churches that are full members of the CCC, there are others that are not. And the other big group that brings Christians together is the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, and there's crossover. So there's some churches that belong to both, and there's some the churches that belong to one or the other, but we have, we've always had some connections, and we often have someone from the EFC participating in regular governing board meetings, but that's a growing thing right now, and we met together in the fall online. And a couple of things that came out of that meeting was a commitment to pray for each other, as well as an interest in being more involved. And so members of the EFC are working on how they may have some of their members join in more than just the governing board of the CCC, but other tables of the council as well, so that they can have more people participating in those conversations.
And then the third thing that we talked about was the possibility of working together on 2033 celebrations. Have you heard of that? It's planned, I think, internationally, a plan to celebrate the resurrection of Christ in 2033 right, 2000 years later, It's good to have anniversaries to celebrate,
[John Borthwick]
I guess so, yeah.
[Amanda Currie]
But what an opportunity to celebrate the resurrection. I mean, we do every year, we do every Sunday. Why not a really big one for 2000 years? And so that seems like a really exciting possibility, bringing together evangelicals and mainline Christians across the spectrum, to be able to celebrate that piece of our faith that is so foundational that very much brings us together.
[John Borthwick]
That's amazing. Yeah, I hadn't thought of that. I'm sure you'll have those people who get really granular and be like, Well, is it really the anniversary? I mean, oh yes, well, we could do that, but let's not, but let's not. That's how you bring unity. We don't, we don't get stuck on things. We don't get stuck on certain things.
[Amanda Currie]
That's right, wonderful.
[John Borthwick]
Well, that's great. Anything else you want to share?
[Amanda Currie]
Maybe what’s been missing from what I've shared so far, is just the sense because, because in my role, I'm kind of really connected with the governing board. So that's the big table where the key representatives come together from the different churches. But there's a lot of different tables of the council. There's a lot of different working groups where different areas of conversation are happening. So we have two commissions. One is the Commission on Faith and Witness. That's the theological commission, right? It's where they're really getting into the nitty gritty of of theology. They have really, really interesting conversations at Faith and Witness, and they've had they, every three years, they pick a new topic for their focus.
So in the last three years that just finished up, they were talking about what it means to be church in the digital age. So I mean, it was inspired by the pandemic, right? And thinking about, how do we respond to that, and how are we church in different ways? And they'll have a report coming out from that conversation that brings together all of their theological reflection on that in a in a coordinated way that should be coming out soon. It's not quite out yet.
But they have moved on to their next topic, which is about the theology of Christian citizenship, thinking about how we are as Christian citizens of the world in the complex political environment in which we live. So that's their current topic. So there's those theological conversations, but then there's a whole other table that's connected. It's also theological, but it's focused on justice and peace. And at that table we have representatives from all the churches, sometimes staff people, sometimes volunteers, lay people, ministers, etc, but they're all people who are deeply passionate about justice and peace, and so they're currently working on questions of anti-racism, and they're talking about poverty, and they're thinking theologically about those things, but also practically about how do we advocate for justice and peace and the care of creation and those kinds of topics. So it's a great way for to bring together that part of the work of each of our denominations, where they can be at a table together and work together and do more together than they could individually.
[Amanda Currie]
Those are the two big tables, but then there's a bunch of others, and there's there's one that's Faith and Life Sciences, which is theological and ethical reflection on Life Sciences and Biotechnology and all the complicated things around that. They have lots of webinars, so people can join in webinars really easily with them. They're doing amazing things. We have a sexual exploitation working group, which is part of the justice and peace side of things. And obviously it's, it's advocating for justice for people who are caught up in the sex trade and that kind of thing. We have a Christian interfaith reference group which is thinking about how Christians and churches engage in interfaith dialog right now, they are very much focused on dialog with indigenous spiritualities, and so thinking about the complicated relationship between churches and indigenous people in Canada. But how do we engage in that conversation and learning around different spiritualities?
Project Ploughshares. I haven't even mentioned Project Ploughshares before yet, so that's a whole website you could go to and explore project Ploughshares. It's the peace research and advocacy unit of the Canadian Council of Churches. And they are. They're working on so many complex things that I personally do not understand all the ins and outs of but nuclear weapons and arms trade and emerging technologies around AI and autonomous weapons and space security, and they are big players on the international scene and big advocates in terms of calling our Canadian government to account to make responsible, just decisions in terms of our involvement in those areas.
So I guess I want to say that the Canadian Council of Churches is this big, diverse network, really, and there are a lot of Presbyterians that are involved in it, like I may have this president title, but that we have people from across our denomination, from across the country, lay people and clergy who have expertise and interest in a whole variety of these topics. And they're at all those tables, and they're making really important contributions to all of those conversations which lead to greater unity, which lead to common action, common witness, all of those things. I feel very privileged to be part of that, but recognize that we have some really, really great people from our denomination that are engaged in a whole variety of ways.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, I'd really wonder if, if within our denomination, people realize how actively involved members of our denomination are in those spaces and places.
[Amanda Currie]
And if anyone reads through the ecumenical interfaith relations committee report, you'll see the list every year, yes, yes, but yeah, it's true. It's true. We have, we have great people at the table. Some of them are staff people, and many of them are not, and well, giving their time.
[John Borthwick]
For sure, and even the intersection with some of the things you've named, I think some people like Project Ploughshares, for example, I would wonder if some people who are aware of Project Ploughshares would actually even realize that it's interconnected with the Canadian Council of Churches. Lots of people see it as a standalone social justice organization.
[Amanda Currie]
There are lots of people that support Project Ploughshares, and, you know, probably aren't even aware of that connection. But yes, they belong, they belong to the CCC, but we're very proud to have the Project Ploughshares and the work that they do as part of part of our mission,
[John Borthwick]
That's amazing, yeah, for sure. So we're recording this episode during the week of prayer of Christian unity, and it seems obviously apt a good time to speak about ecumenism, for sure. I hinted at this in the introduction, but I wondering if you can speak a little bit about how the CCC embodies a unified voice on matters of theology, faith and witness. You've touched on it a little bit. I'll save my next question for maybe just talk about the CCC, and then we can talk a little more about how you're seeing that in other spaces and places as you, as you navigate this. So, yeah, how does the CCC do it? How do you have a unified voice on matters of faith.
[Amanda Currie]
26 member denominations and that great diversity that you you mentioned in the introduction as well? Um, we don't always agree about everything. That's for sure, lots of, lots of things, where, where we're not in a place to come to a common mind or a common purpose on lots of things, and there are things that that we have differences in, that are not necessarily church dividing differences. They're not necessarily something that needs to keep us apart. They're the kinds of things where you go. Well, isn't that beautiful? Isn't that gift of that church, or that particular focus of that church isn't that lovely. It's not the way we do it, but it can be beautiful. And sometimes we think of that when we gather for worship and we experience liturgies of different churches, and we say, I maybe don't want to worship in that particular way on a regular basis, but it's a beautiful offering. And isn't it beautiful that I can join in that?
And so there are lots of things that are differences, but are not necessarily something that keeps us apart. It's just It's just that there's diversity, and that's a good thing. But then there are other issues where we might come to the table and go, You know what? It really troubles me at times that this church believes this or has this practice because it's rooted in something that they just have a different idea than what my church does, or what I do as an individual. And you can automatically think, here's this Presbyterian ordained woman who hangs out in the Catholic church all the time, and yet the Catholic Church doesn't ordain women, and women's roles, although they're continuing to grow and have new opportunities within the Catholic Church, it's still something that's troubling. It's not a small issue. And we might say that around the CCC table, there are many different convictions and opinions about the place of 2SLGBTQI people within the church, that's a big, important, deep issue. It's not something that we can just say, well, it's all right that we're just a little different from each other.
But I think that the CCC embodies unity by being at the tables together, by being in the conversation, by being committed to come together, even though there are really hard issues that continue to separate us. So it's that determination to be together, even when there's difference, even when some of those things, we don't know how they're going to get worked out maybe one day, but it seems like a far off thing, but to be able to gather together and pray and worship and to to stay in the conversation, to stay in the relationship, and to build the relationship even when, when there may be something that someone would say, Well, I can't even talk to that person, because they maybe, you know, they believe these things, and they're just so, so different from what I believe. I don't even want to be there. But people who come to those tables say I want to be there, even though we're not there yet. There's a level of respect for one another that I have experienced within the CCC that gives me such confidence and joy that there is a possibility for agreement down the road. Certainly as an ordained woman, interacting with many leaders from different traditions, where that's not a thing, and yet, the respect and collegiality that I experience in those spaces is amazing despite those differences.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, as you, as you're sharing this, you were intimately connected as moderator to some decisions that we were seeking the Spirit’s unity for the PCC. And, yeah, I find it I wonder, for folks who are listening today, if a little bit of what you've just shared, there could be a partly an inspiration for, how does the Presbyterian Church in Canada continue to move forward together, come to the table together. In spite of the fact that there that there are some differences of stance, belief, faith, however you want to express it, upon issues related to the ordination of LGBTQI+ persons, and leadership in the church in this way, and also same sex marriage and things like that. I just wonder, I found what you were saying was really interesting, just related to that piece, especially because I see it as an actual table, like you have to come to the table. And we've been coming to the table for 80 years now, and yet, we come from 26 different maybe there was less in the beginning,
[Amanda Currie]
It's grown over the years.
[John Borthwick]
And yet we come from very, as you've acknowledged, we come from very different traditions. With, with, certainly, yeah, I don't want to make, I don't know, simplify it too much, but just even as you've described it, some very basic, basic but yet, so, because of tradition, such intense difference around the the reality of another across the table. So just as you've described it, you know, if I'm a, if I'm coming as an orthodox priest, and you're sitting across the table for me as a minister within the Presbyterian Church in Canada, there's some tradition stuff here that's going to be saying, Hmm, I don't know where you fit, and things like that. And I'm sure there's other matters of diversity amongst the different member churches as well. That would be we, technically, we shouldn't be at the table together, but we are committed to keeping coming to the table. Is that? Is that fair to see? Am I making sense?
[Amanda Currie]
I think that’s a big part of it, it's the commitment to stay in relationship and I think that it comes from a conviction that the church is one, that we believe that the church is one, and our divisions are not the way it's supposed to be. And so what is it that holds us together? It's our faith in Christ. It's Christ that holds us together. And those other things, the unimportant things, but also the important things that we haven't worked out, the stuff that's really not good, that we haven't worked those things out, and yet we've decided that we want to be together, because we're meant to be together, that we're meant to we're meant to be one. And so if we keep coming to that table, maybe slowly, we could work more of those things out. I mean, we have, if you look historically, we've worked out a lot. We've worked out a huge amount since most of those divisions happened and we keep coming back again and again.
When I think about our unity within the Presbyterian Church in Canada, I think in the last five years, we've come a long way, and part of that had to do with acknowledging difference, really, saying yes, we really, really don't agree, and we really can't come to agreement on some of these things. But is there a way that we can be united in Christ? We can be united in our Presbyterian Heritage and our faith, and also say there's some stuff that we have to just make space for being able to be different on this thing? But it's only going to work if we are going to love and respect each other and be at the table together. And so of course, over the last few years, we've seen some individuals and some congregations deciding, I just can't be at the table with you, and they've had to leave, which is sad, but also, can the rest of us with our diversity and even with our things that they're really hard and we really want to work them out, but can we continue to come to the table with that kind of respect and love for each other, with the hope that God will lead us eventually to that fullness of unity. In the meantime, we will do our best to live into the unity that we've been given.
[John Borthwick]
This will sound really silly, but when I was at Knox College in seminary, I remember saying out loud when we were talking about the spirit inspiring the church to understand things it was, it was related mostly around ordination vows and things like that. But just this sort of conversation around the Spirit will continue to inspire us to think differently about scripture, to think differently, new ways about our theology and things like that. It was a Spirit's inspiration. And I remember saying this, this I was, I'm just me. I can't help myself. But I remember saying as sitting in class and saying to the professors, and there was three of them at the at the front, at this one, and I said, Well, if we believe the Holy Spirit, is there's a oneness in the Holy Spirit, how come everybody hasn't got the same message? Like, how did this happen? You know, like, if the Spirit has inspired us to think this way about something, then why isn't the Spirit passing that message on to others within, and this was denominationally, right? And the professor at the front of the room said, that's a really interesting question, John, I hope you keep asking that question.
[Amanda Currie]
It's a good question to keep asking, And yet, as Presbyterians, there is this sense that when we come together and we talk and we pray and we even debate and we like but we're when we're at the table in the courts of the church, we believe that the Holy Spirit does guide us. We believe that this Holy Spirit can guide us together towards something, towards something that God is calling us to. And it's a big leap of faith to say, like the Spirit's going keep on working. And I think it's the same thing of each of those tables within the CCC, it's trusting that the Spirit can guide us towards something, even if we don't see the fullness of that in our lifetimes?
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, I think we're I think that's where we get limited or and we forget ourselves. We don't get to see the big picture. We see in a mirror dimly. It seems to be the way it goes. So as we, as we wrap up our conversation, I'm curious, we hear so often that the future of the Christian church is a church without denominations. Do you personally envision this as a future reality for the church, and maybe from your perspective, as the President of the CCC and a passionate advocate of ecumenism, what might be lost if we actually move in a direction of devaluing our denominational heritages? What do you think?
[Amanda Currie]
I don't think the future of the church is one without denominations, although maybe it won't be the word denominations. I do think that there is great value in the healthy diversity, the diversity that doesn't need to divide us from one another. It's just that I think that the Spirit has yet to lead us into figuring out what that's going to look like, so that we can be one. But also you have unity with diversity, unity with uniformity, it's just going to be a loss. I don't even know which uniformity like which model you would pick, whether it be about structures or literature. Your particular answers to questions.
But someone once, and I don't even remember who this was, but it was a long time ago, at some ecumenical conference I was at, where someone suggested that maybe the unified church that God might be calling us towards would look a little bit more like, and this was a Catholic person who mentioned this, so they were very familiar with the idea that there's one Catholic Church, one Catholic Church throughout the world, but then there are different religious orders and even different rites within the Catholic Church. So they're not everybody's following the same liturgy, but they do still belong to the Catholic Church, and so they imagine what would that look like if it was the whole Christian Church throughout the world, that they would be the idea that we had, we had come together more formally, I don't know what that structure would look like, but we would be together. But also we wouldn't all be the same as each other. And I think it would have to allow for a back and forth between so you could move from, you could worship in your maybe it won't, I don't know if it would call be Presbyterian, but anyway, but you could worship in your Presbyterian Church, and then you could move over, and you could worship in that Orthodox Church, and you might have a primary identity as one particular way of being church together in that community, but you'd be welcome, and you'd still belong when you went over to that other one. And so there would be that diversity of charisms and mission priorities and maybe even different ways of ordering ourselves within different sections, but yet it wouldn't be a block. It wouldn't be like, you're not us, you're not us, like it would be a sense of we all belong to the one church, and so that freedom to come back and forth and be in relationship and work together and those kinds of things. I don't know how we're going to get there, and maybe that's not right at all. Yeah, we could dream.
[John Borthwick]
And I think, I think we often have a naive or simplistic view of what the church, the ancient church, looked like. And there's been some great scholarship over the last decade or more, that's kind of unpacked that for folks, if they're, if they're listening, and if they're reading some stuff that just to say, like, we have this notion of, why can't the church be like it was in the early church, like, Why can't it's like it actually is kind of in the sense that there wasn't this unity. Like, yes, in the you know, the book of Acts, it looks like it's all, you know, sunshine and roses and it's beautiful, and there's all this unity. But if you keep reading in the book of Acts, there clearly is some diversity. And then if you go deeper and understand the historical, ancient, early church, and beyond, there was so much difference of, and around very big things, like, is Jesus God? Is he just a man? Is he, you know, those kind of things, and then just how we practice and what's important and what are the essentials? And I think people get stuck on this, you know, rose colored glasses, of how they see the early church, and think that this lack of unity, or one church, is somehow the fatal flaw of the church, and yet, that's who we were from the day Jesus died and rose again. You know that over that weekend, we became the church that then, in a way, in our essence we still are today. I ponder, I think, you know, there's such diversity in how we think about things, what our theologies are, but also how we practice it. What's important all those kinds of things?
[Amanda Currie]
Yeah, one of my favorite books of the Bible is First Corinthians. And partly it's because it's this struggle between clearly divisions and separations and struggle with different ideas about certain things, but also that call to to stay together, to love one another despite differences, to recognize diversities. And that's certainly been the challenge of the church all the way along. And the other thing that comes to mind is that that points again to the Week of Prayer for Christian unity, because this year's theme for 2025 is about Nicaea. Nicaea in the year 325, where it was all about trying to be unified and figure out, what is it that we believe, what is the doctrine of our faith? But it was also a struggle, because as soon as you lay down some words, you shut some people out, who are, you know, fall in the heretic side of things. So that's 1700 years, and that's the theme that week of prayer for Christian unity is about. So it's sort of like the more things change, the more they kind of remain the same. So I hope that people will explore those resources. I mean, we're recording this during the Week of Prayer, so it's probably too late to tell you to do something. Week. But you can use those resources anytime, whether it's for a special service in your neighbourhood. You don't have to do it in January, when it's super, super cold, especially in Saskatchewan. But you can also use the there's Eight Days of Bible study that come with those. So those are really adaptable to use in whether it be a ministerial group, or, you know, group of lay people getting together and exploring them together. So really encourage you to do that.
[John Borthwick]
The other thing I think is fascinating, that you've that you spoke about, and you live out as well, is and you use words about love and respect, a really again, maybe a really simple example, but I think it does, surprisingly come up a lot in Presbyterian churches in context where the community is older, mostly, and may have some Scottish and Irish heritage. So the church I served in the city of Guelph, it had a bit of that flavor to it. And so one of the thing, one of the touch points between the big basilica on the Hill, which I actually had the privilege of speaking at, it was the, it was a big celebration of John McCrae. So in the city of Guelph, sorry, Montreal. John McCrae actually went to St Andrews in Guelph, his family and everything else. That's where he's from. That's where he's born and raised. So they put a big statue on what they called for its season, Catholic Hill. And there's a giant basilica in Guelph that's right on the top of that hill. And so I actually got to be, because I was a minister of St Andrews on right on that hill, talking to addressing a crowd of people. The Governor General was there. It was so very exciting. I jokingly said that I reclaimed the hill in the name of Presbyterians, and there was laughter and hilarity, but people in the church, in the church that I served, would often say things about not being welcome at table, at Eucharist, at the mass, and things like that. And I talked to them often about the fact that I had been to mass many times and because of certain relationships I had, I said to them, you know, I believe, I actually believe the priest, I'm not naming any names for the sake of this being recorded, but I believe the priest, if I went up to the if I went up, the priest would probably have served me, but out of respect for him, I would never put him in that situation, because I have respect and love for his role as he does things, and I was a public figure of some kind in the city of Guelph, and it wouldn't be appropriate for him to be placed in that position. And so I don't participate in that way, but I would go up for a blessing. And yet, there was this, and some of this is old historic cultural challenges within Scottish and Northern Irish folks who have lived very tense lives between that religious diversity, but just that, I loved how you phrased throughout this conversation, just the idea of, how do you maintain love and respect in in spite of the differences, and also whole and there's a love and respect that comes from the one who may feel like they're being excluded or diminished in some way by the other, but a recognition of, you know that there's, there's tradition, there's history, there's, there's something about the other that that has brought them to this point. So, yeah, I really think that's a beautiful thing.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, that question of sacramental sharing, and particularly the separation at the Eucharist at the Lord's table, is probably one of the biggest issues for interchurch families. And it certainly is an issue wherever, wherever Christians have opportunity to come together and worship, and then they have questions about, to what degree can they share? And I think one of the big things is having the open and honest conversations about the reasons why, and they're not often what people expect they are so if a table of egoistic table in another church is not open to you, first of all, it's not about you. It's not about you being lacking anything. It's more deeply about the church's divisions, ongoing divisions, and because the Eucharist and the sacrament is seen as this sign of our unity, there's this sense that if we share in that across the table, but we're not actually, our churches are not actually unified, that it becomes this sort of false unity. And it's a complicated issue, and it's certainly it's something that that that causes a lot of angst and challenge for people and feelings around who you are and how you're connected. So I think big part of that is that having the open conversation, so there aren't questions about, you know, if I'm there, can I participate if I'm there, and why? Why can't I or, or, Why, why shouldn't I or how much can I, even when others come to Presbyterian churches where we talk about having an open table, are we okay with someone who's present and prays with us but doesn't feel like they can come to the table, not for personal reasons, but because of the unity that's not there yet. So they're big issues, important issues, and a big part of is keep talking and keep exploring together.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, that's amazing. I really appreciate that. Amanda, yeah, how you, how you live that out, how you, how you model that as as the President, in that working together and just that, that constant reminder of we're invited to come to the table together, and please continue to come to the table so that we can keep that conversation going and allow for the Spirit to move within all of us. So not to say that our own personal agendas are going to get moved along in any particular way, but just that we're the unity that comes from being together in love and respect. That's really beautiful. I wonder, as we, a couple of final things you've mentioned the Week of Prayer for Christian unity. Can you tell us about some other you've also highlighted some other initiatives of the CCC?
[Amanda Currie]
And a few and I was just looking at, I made a few notes about which ones to highlight. And I've mentioned most of them, but one I haven't what is it a resource that's coming out very soon. I don't think it's out quite yet, but it should be quite soon, from the Commission on Justice and Peace. And one of the things that we're thinking about, how, how the church, how the how the council, and how the Canadian Council of Churches speaks together about topics. Sometimes it's not easy because of diversity, like sometimes it's hard to say we can come up with this statement that we all agree about, or a policy that we all think should be done this way. And one of the topics that Justice and Peace has been working on the last little while is about anti-racism. It's super, super important, relevant in all of our contexts, but also really, really difficult. And so one of the things that they decided to do, and I guess they probably started working on this about a year ago or so, was they decided that maybe one way that they could offer leadership in the church on this important topic without having to come to agreement about everything, was to put together a devotional, and that's what they've been working on. It's just, I think, in the final stages of editing and ready to come out. And it's a devotional that draws upon the experience of people in a wide variety of the churches of the council, different parts of the country, different backgrounds. Almost all of the authors are people of color, of some sort. There's lots of diversity in the groups. And they're lay people, and their clergy with lots of different kinds of experiences, and they offer a scripture to reflect on, and a reflection from their own experience about it. Some of them are super deep theological, and some of them are very practical, and some of them are very experiential, but it is absolutely packed with wisdom and inspiration as we think about how we and our churches live into being not only not racist, but anti-racist. So I really, I know that people will really find it a helpful resource when it comes out. So I invite you to watch for that.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, that sounds really interesting. I feel I'm having a memory that maybe the World Council of Churches also brought out a resource, a different kind of resource, perhaps related to anti racism as well.
[Amanda Currie]
Yeah, the WCC has done lots of work on racism stuff as well.
[John Borthwick]
And again, the what, the volume of work that has gone into creating these things, the number of meetings and conversations and people, writing and rewriting and editing and all the things. And it's offered, I hate to say the word free, it makes it seem less, but it's offered so freely and generously to the wider church to be able to be used, and, you know, opportunities for leaders, or ecumenical leaders, to get together and have conversations. But even within your own congregation, if you were looking for resources to support conversations around an ecumenical kind of lens, there's some amazing resources at the Canadian Council of Churches that you can take advantage of.
[Amanda Currie]
None of them have like price tags associated with them. We've all contributed as our churches have supported the CCC.
[John Borthwick]
We pay our dues.
[Amanda Currie]
There's lots of stuff there to draw up on. So that's another thing you can do as well. Is like, whether it's a recent, this is a brand new resource that's coming out, but there's lots of archives of different, you know, different, different studies on different topics, theological stuff that you could you could. Who's in your local congregation, or in a conversation between a couple of local churches, and make it an ecumenical conversation about a topic that's of interest to you.
[John Borthwick]
That's great. It's great that it's there. I said to you earlier, Amanda, before we started that, I'm also planning on having a conversation with Jerry Pillay, who is the he's the General Secretary of the World Council of Churches, and he's a friend of our Principal Ernest Van Eck, they serve together at the University of Pretoria in South Africa, and so I'm looking forward to having a conversation with him, and some of the questions I'll be asking him are very similar to the ones I've asked you. So the Ministry Forum audience is going to be getting a deep dive in ecumenism. I also have a plan to reach out to is it Sandra Beardsall, yes, at the Prairie Center.
[Amanda Currie]
She has been involved in the Prairie Center for Ecumenism over the years. Reverend Dr Sandra Beardsall is a United Church minister based in Saskatoon, and she's retired from being the Professor of Church History and Ecumenics at St Andrews College, the United Church college that's in Saskatoon, and she's the speaker this year across Saskatchewan for the week of prayer for Christian unity, talking about Nicaea. So she's doing workshops and lectures and things like that. And, yeah, she'd be a great person to talk to. She also was on the World Council of Churches, Faith and Order.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, well, and she's a she's a friend or good colleague in connecting with our academic dean, Christine Mitchell, who served at St Andrew. She’s also done a lot of work, and this might be a good spin off for people to think about as well, the number of churches that are doing ecumenical, shared ministries. From what I heard from Christine, she's a great resource. Sandra is a great resource for thinking about that communities of practice around that, best practices around that.
[Amanda Currie]
Indeed, she was a pastor in an ecumenical shared ministry in Newfoundland at the early in her ministry, before she moved to Saskatchewan, and she has done a lot of work on and helping other other congregations that are thinking about what that might look like.
[John Borthwick]
So it's certainly an emerging model. I mean, it's been around for a long, long time, but it's certainly an emerging model. I'm hoping that people aren't making the decisions simply about finances, but because I think there's a lot more that needs to go into it, maybe someone who entered into a covenant with another person from another denominational heritage would understand that as well fully. There's a sense you want to know who you are, and who you are and who they are, and how all those things merge together. And I hope that churches that are exploring those ecumenical, shared ministries are really, are really thinking deeply around how you how you sustain that relationship for the long haul, and how you do that really well, not just about, hey, you your church can't afford it, and our church can't afford it. Let's just get together and, yeah, that's not the best way to enter into a long-term relationship. If you want it to be really thriving.
[Amanda Currie]
Yeah, you actually have to love each other.
[John Borthwick]
Boom. That's, that's the Mic drop. Thank you. I appreciate that so much. Yes, that is the truth. We must love each other as a part of that relationship to begin with.
[Amanda Currie]
That's what holds us together, really, is the love.
[John Borthwick]
It certainly does.
[Amanda Currie]
Even when the difficulties come or the agree disagreements come.
[John Borthwick]
Amen. Is there anything I haven't asked you that you just wished and were burning for me to say so that you could get another word in?
[Amanda Currie]
No, I think that's good. You're asking great questions.
[John Borthwick]
I’ll leave it there. Thank you so much for joining me today, Amanda. I appreciate you so much. And appreciate the leadership you've given the PCC over that over that season of the of the life of the church, and to be thrown into something where, hey, I signed on for one year. What? What is going on? Way to go. Really appreciate you and for your long service and ministry in the in the different settings you've been in. You've provided such strong leadership in Saskatchewan as a province, and I know you continue to do, you go above and beyond in the ways in which you serve the one universal church, but also certainly the particular churches in the communities that you've served, and even the presbytery and Synod in Saskatchewan, they are blessed to have you there. So thank you so much.
[Amanda Currie]
Thanks for inviting me to be part of this and I hope that more people will get connected with the Canadian Council of Churches.
[John Borthwick]
I hope so too. This is the first step.
[Amanda Currie]
Thanks.
[John Borthwick]
Thanks for joining us today on the Ministry Forum Podcast. We hope today's episode resonated with you and sparked your curiosity. Remember, you're not alone in your ministry journey. We're at the other end of some form of technology, and our team is committed to working hard to support your ministry every step of the way. If you enjoyed today's episode, tell your friends, your family, your colleagues. Tell someone. Please don’t keep us a secret, and of course, please subscribe, rate and leave a review in the places you listen to podcasts. Your feedback helps us reach more ministry leaders just like you. And honestly, it reminds us that we're not alone either. And don't forget to follow us on social media at Ministry Forum on all of our channels. You can visit our website@ministryforum.ca for more resources keeping up with upcoming events and ways to connect with our growing community until next time. May God's strength and courage be yours in all that you do. May you be fearless, not reckless, and may you be well in body, mind and spirit, and may you be that peace.