Sandra Beardsall - Ecumenical Shared Ministry
Summary:
In this episode, Rev. Dr. Sandra Beardsall reflects on her lifelong journey with ecumenism, from early personal curiosity to decades of practical engagement. She discusses her role with the World Council of Churches’ Nicaea 2025 initiative, the rich history and evolving role of the Nicene Creed, and the broader movement for church unity. A significant portion of the conversation explores ecumenical shared ministries in Canada—what they are, how they function, and how they offer faithful, creative responses to challenges in ministry. She shares historical insights, practical examples, and thoughtful reflections on what unity and diversity mean for the Church today. The episode offers a deep and hopeful look at ecumenism from someone with lived experience and academic insight.
About Sandra Beardsall
Sandra was raised in Brampton, Ontario. She was a ministry candidate from Grace United Church, ordained in 1985. She served rural congregations in Newfoundland and Labrador and Eastern Ontario before her appointment as Professor of Church History and Ecumenics at St. Andrew’s College in 1997. She lives in Saskatoon with her spouse, the Rev. Dr. Bill Richards, Professor Emeritus of Early Christian Language and Literature of the College of Emmanuel and St. Chad. She enjoys ongoing volunteer work, especially ecumenical engagement, and is a Voluntary Associate Minister at Grace-Westminster United Church, Saskatoon.
Additional Resources:
Article: Sandra Beardsall reflects on 2025 WCC Conference on Faith & Order
Follow us on Social:
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]
Today on the Ministry Forum Podcast, we're talking ecumenism again, yes, following on from our interview with The Reverend Amanda Currie, president of the Canadian Council of Churches, and our episode marking the week of prayer for Christian Unity, with a recording of the sermon from Knox College chapel by the Reverend Dr Pablo Kim Sun, intercultural liaison for the presbytery and church in Canada that he delivered to A gathering of Toronto School of Theology staff and students, our soon to be shared episode where we had a chance also to talk with the Reverend Professor Dr Jerry Pillay, General Secretary of the World Council of Churches. You, Ministry Forum, audience are certainly getting a solid grounding in the world of ecumenism, whether you like it or not, and today's interview will contribute brilliantly to enhancing your knowledge and perhaps igniting or fueling more passionately your own desire to pursue more ecumenical relationships and attentiveness.
Today's guest The Reverend Professor Dr Sandra Beardsall. Sandra was raised in Brampton, Ontario, and she was a ministry candidate from Grace United Church and ordained in 1985. She served rural congregations in Newfoundland and Labrador and Eastern Ontario before her appointment as Professor of Church History and Human Ecumenics for some reason I got stuck on that one, you can help me with that. Ecumenics at St Andrews College in 1997 she lives in Saskatoon with her spouse, the Reverend Dr Bill Richards, professor emeritus of early Christian language and literature of the College of Emmanuel and St Chad. She enjoys ongoing volunteer work, especially ecumenical engagement, and is a voluntary Associate Minister at Grace, Westminster United Church. Saskatoon, I'm aware that there's so much more to say about your life and work. Sandra and I look forward to sharing our conversation with our ministry forum audience at Knox College. We often hear of St Andrews college Saskatoon as our Dean Christine Mitchell, was on staff there prior to joining our community, and she was instrumental mental in making our connection today, and certainly sings your praises in the world of ecumenical shared ministries and so much more. Sandra, welcome. It's great to have you on the Ministry Forum Podcast today.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Oh, it's a delight to be here. Thanks for inviting me, John, especially after all those other illustrious ecumenical guests?
[John Borthwick]
Yes, we certainly have been filling our cup with ecumenism, and we're delighted to do so. So Sandra, maybe let's start with a little more about you. I've touched on some of the things that you shared on your bio at St Andrews College website. But is there anything else of by way of introduction that you'd like to share with our Ministry Forum audience?
[Sandra Beardsall]
Well, that was that was pretty thorough. So thank you for that. And I so I'm originally from Ontario, but have lived a long time in Saskatoon on Treaty Six Territory, but also ministered in Newfoundland and Labrador. And included in that was a shared ministry, Anglican and United. So we can talk a little bit more about that later. And otherwise, you know, my, one of my other activities is Scottish country dancing, so there's a little bit of a Presbyterian connection to that,
[John Borthwick]
You're making fans amongst the Presbyterian.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Okay that's good. And of course, I I value my relationship with Dr Christine Mitchell, and I'm glad that she's serving so well at Knox Church in or at Knox College in in Toronto. Yeah, that's, I think you've covered many things there, so that's fine.
[John Borthwick]
Excellent. So maybe it happened in Newfoundland and Labrador. But where did this spirit of ecumenism come from in your journey? Personally?
[Sandra Beardsall]
Well, that was an interesting question for me. It started very early. I remember as a young child, I was taken to the United Church by my parents, but I was always curious about those other people, my friends who went to other churches, and what were they doing? My best friend, for a time when I was, you know, around 10 and 11 was, or was a Baptist, and I ended up going to her Baptist church camp, her Camp Hermosa on the shores of Lake Huron and and I learned a different way of being Christian, and it wasn't the way I had experienced it. But it wasn't bad. It was interesting and when I was about 11 and one or 12, I guess, and wanting to be confirmed, I got it in my head that before I was confirmed, United Church, I should go and visit, you know, some other churches to be sure. So that was a rather cursory experience. I had a Pentecostal friend, so I was, you know, went to one of her services, one service with an Anglican friend, and I was a Brownie at the Girl Guide, I guess, by that time, at the Baptist Church. And so that the sum total of that experience, I decided I would be United Church, but, but I always was curious. So I guess there were Catholics that lived in my neighborhood but couldn't come to my school because they went to a Catholic school, and I always wanted to know more. So, I guess it started very young and continued from there, when I did have real ecumenical encounters in university, in theological school I attended, you know, I was at the Toronto School of Theology, and then, and then in ministry. So just carried on from there.
[John Borthwick]
That's amazing. I love that you before you were going to take the plunge with the United, as you said, I need to check out some other places just to make sure that this is what I want to do. That's an amazing gift. Well done. Yeah, I was actually baptized United because it was the closest church in the community where my parents lived. So they lived on the top of Lake Superior in Nipigon, and they weren't going to drive to the Presbyterian Church, they said, So I got baptized united. Little ecumenism in my early days.
[Sandra Beardsall]
There you go, right from the start.
[John Borthwick]
Right indeednow, when I was doing a little bit of a search about yourself online, I discovered that you are the Moderator of the Nicaea 2025, steering group of the World Council of Churches, commission on faith and order. Wow. Can you tell us a bit more about that role? When I was interviewing Amanda Currie, she spoke of this, and when Jerry Pillay was at Knox College for a visit in December, he also spoke of this big celebration of the Nicene Creed.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Right, right, and the Council of Nicea, right? So, well I can, so I'm a member of the Faith and Order Commission that's a long standing organization. It predates the founding of the World Council of Churches, which was founded in 1948 but it it was Christians getting together before that concerned about that, that the churches needed to discuss more than just their ministries in mission, which is what they were up to, but they needed to talk about what do we believe, and how can we reconcile our beliefs, and how do we organize ourselves? So that's where the order comes in. It isn't sort of policing. It's more of an organization and now that commission is absorbed, of course, into the World Council of Churches. And people are appointed to that via being nominated by their church. So I was nominated by the United Church of Canada, and then, out of the nominations, they form a commission at the World Council of Churches that votes on a commission.
So I was serving on that commission when the idea came that they would like to celebrate the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea that happened in what's now Iznik, Turkey was then Nicaea in the Roman Empire, and close to what was going to become Constantinople, where the Emperor Constantine was building himself his own City. And he wanted to bring the Christians together, because he'd heard there were some conflicts, but he recognized, and he was the emperor who first recognized and legitimated Christianity as the Empire, as a legitimate and then kind of central piece of the empire. And he was worried that these Christians if they stay divided, might harm his own empire in some ways. So he called this council, you know, 1700 years ago, and said, I need you to get on the same page together. And, and there were disputes among them, but he invited them, he paid for the council, and they sat together for about six weeks and wrestled through their differences and came out with decisions, including the most, the one that's the most commonly understood, and that is the Nicene Creed. And that creed is important to us, because it's the only creed that all Christians in the world at some point signed on to. All the bishops in the world were invited to the to the night the Council of Nicea, and most of them came and so there's a sense that we've never been as united as a church as we were at Nicaea, even though it was difficult and there were people that were upset. So why commemorate it now, it's a long time ago, but it's also just this opportunity to reflect on, okay, What happened there? Not just the creed. But that's important, of course. What does that creed mean for us, especially in churches where you know the Nicene Creed isn't often used, and our United Church and maybe our Presbyterian churches are examples where you know that creed isn't sort of front and center the way it is in the Catholic Church, and certainly an Orthodox Church is where it's set every day. So what does it mean to us to have this common creed and that's so that's part of what we want to discuss, and what does it mean that some churches don't use creeds and so how do we find our unity when we don't have those things to unite us.
And then also just to ask ourselves where are we now, for invisible unity where, how do we stand together as churches and where, what, what inhibits us and what, and what can we celebrate. That meant that it would be a good time to have a World Conference, which the Faith and Order Commission has held five previous times over since 1927, the last one was in 1993 in 1993 a long time ago. And so this one will be in it will have happened in October in Egypt at the invitation of the Coptic Orthodox Church, a big Christian Church in Egypt and we will be at a retreat center near Alexandria, close to some ancient monastic foundations, and about 150 of us together will kind of reflect on the will reflect on these questions together from all around the world and all different church traditions, including churches that are not members of the World Council of Churches. So it's a broad sweep of churches.
I sort of fell into being the moderator for the steering group of this. I won't go into the details. Anybody who's Presbyterian knows what it's like to sort of get seconded to do some work on a committee and partly it is I think because I speak English and I come from a church that likes to be organized and so those skills are being put to use as we bring to pull together, this this big conference. We’re planning that this conference will have all of its main sessions live streamed and recorded so that people around the world with some translation into other languages so that people around the world can be participating at relatively the same time as this conference is happening, and engage in it together. So we're hoping those things will help it all come to be. So that's the short one and why of Nicea 2025.
[John Borthwick]
That’s amazing. You're quite right. In all my years in congregational ministry I must confess, we've probably, we probably only use the Nicene Creed maybe, maybe five times in my 25 years. Yeah, we just didn't, didn't get to it much we would do the Apostles Creed for sure, but even that's even the creeds themselves, I find in the presbyterian church are really starting to, maybe, I don't know, fall from use in, you know, the tradition of you might have it. I just led communion in a two-point charge on Sunday in one church they have a tradition of using the Apostles Creed in the other church they didn't. I think we're seeing that probably across the country.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Well, you know, the reformed tradition, we all said yes to all the creeds. So we, you know, we didn't deny that we, we agreed to those faith statements. But there's, you know, been more of an emphasis on, you know, the kind of ability to claim your faith personally in some way, or name it. And sort of name your own theology. And so certainly the United Church, that's the same. We inherit it in slightly different ways from Methodists and Presbyterians and Congregationalists. But we all, we didn't sort of center ourselves around that ancient practice of saying creeds together.
My task, I guess, is to kind of invite everybody to think about their relationship with creeds. And of course, for Protestants, it's saying, Well, what might it how might it help us to really reflect on, and I've had to reflect much more deeply on the Nicene Creed being part of this and realizing there's some real gifts there and riches there. What might we benefit from, you know, exploring it a little more? And so kind of trying to encourage not just, you know, not just the historic Protestants. But then there are the Pentecostals and others who say, you never say a creed, because it all has to come from the heart, so inviting them into that question. But then also I hear Catholics and Orthodox folks and, you know, and some others who use the Creed more regularly, say, you know, the problem is we so say it so often, we don't listen to it anymore. And so what does it mean for us to pay attention to the words we're really saying each time we say it? And so I think all of those things can invite us into a kind of deeper reflection on our own discipleship and our own faith which I think is crucial in an age where our especially in places like Canada and other western countries faith, you know, Christian faith is kind of undermined, and we feel a little bit besieged in many ways, including our faith communities. So how do we strengthen our own you know, the faith at the core of our own being that's part of what brings us to this.
[John Borthwick]
I think yeah for sure, yeah. And definitely in Protestant churches, very, very true in Presbyterian context, when the Apostles Creed is being said, I always find it fascinating where there's a kind of a mumble or almost a hush tone, as we say, we believe in the Holy Catholic Church we just, we're not sure. The Presbyterians just aren't sure that. Should we be saying that out loud?
[Sandra Beardsall]
I always find that you find that at baptisms of you know, United Church, or of folks especially like that, we did you just baptize my child into the Catholic Church? Well, actually, I did, but it's not the Roman Catholic Church it's the Holy Catholic Church all of us together.
[John Borthwick]
Indeed, well, certainly in the show notes and just because it's now on our radar, radar at Ministry Forum, we're going to continue to sort of keep people checking out the World Council of Churches website and the Nicea 2025 website as well. Like it sounds like a really interesting moment in time for us as the Christian church across the globe. That's amazing and amazing to be a part of that.
[Sandra Beardsall]
It is, I'm very honored. I'm lucky, because Canadians are disproportionately represented in the world. Council of Churches. Canadians were really at the forefront of the early Ecumenical Movement in, in the world, and so we play a larger than life role, really, all through the World Council and it's so, you know, I think I'm benefiting from the history of that relationship, and they, they count on Canadians to be part of it all.
[John Borthwick]
So that's great. Yeah, nice Canadian flag thing to wave as a part of it all,
[Sandra Beardsall]
right in these difficult days,
[John Borthwick]
Right in these times? Yes. Sandra, when I mentioned your name to folks, people often associate you with the Prairie Center for Ecumenism. Can you tell me a little bit more about the center and maybe your involvement with them over the years?
[Sandra Beardsall]
Sure. Yes. Well, the Prairie Center for Ecumenism was founded in the 1980s by a Roman Catholic priest Father Bernard de Margerie. And he had he was a recent ordinant at the time of the Second Vatican Council. And so, just as he had been ordained and was kind of embarking on ministry this council kind of upended the Catholic Church in many ways, or opened, you know, opened the doors and the windows and he became really fascinated with the possibility of ecumenical engagement. He was set on fire for ecumenism, and it asked his asked his bishop if he could pursue that as part of his ministry and he got permission to do that. And there's a great story from early in his ministry when he and another priest. Well, you know, we should try to visit some Protestants. And the United Church was having its regional, its conference meeting, you know, so all the churches in Saskatchewan were coming together at Knox United Church in Saskatoon, and he asked if they could, if these two, if he and his colleague could maybe come to this meeting. So he tells the story of him, he and his ministry colleagues showing up in their little black clericals and quaking in their boots like terrified they'd be thrown out. And of course, they received a standing ovation. Everyone was so happy to see them, and it sort of solidified his vision. And he worked really hard to bring the other churches in. First, the Catholics just sponsored this with their own finances, and finally, they convinced other denominations to come on board. And so it's multi-denominational. Each of the denominations contributes financially and to the board membership. So, when I moved to Saskatoon to take up a job, oh and yeah, the pronunciation is ecumenics, but nobody uses that word anymore, and it's usually, and usually spell check makes it economics. So, but I was church history ecumenic. So it was, I was a natural to be asked if I would be the United Church member of the board. So I joined the board for a number of years, but I've stayed just connected to their work because of my work and my interests. And it's a wonderful little center with very with very few resources manages to do as much as it can. It has, it sponsors the week of prayer for Christian unity. It's, it sponsors a whole part of their website for ecumenical shared ministries. They're the only ones who have a full, a full directory of ecumenical shared ministries in Canada. But they also sponsor educational opportunities and very supportive of work of the Canadian Council of Churches. So a lot of work from a small, small organization, so that I'm just happy to be able to support them in that.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, and if it feels like maybe it's just how the world is aligning, and the personalities and people who are in that neck of the woods of Saskatoon, but it just feels like there's something about Saskatchewan that brings out ecumenism. Is there something about Saskatchewan that brings out ecumenism? I don't know.
[Sandra Beardsall]
There is, to some extent, in that as settlement of you know the settler colonial project, when did its way across Canada, you know, Saskatchewan and the other prairie provinces were sparsely populated, they needed to work together in many ways. So that's where cooperative movements formed and all sorts of things. But also then they cooperated ministry wise. So they formed ecumenical ministries before even the United Church, Church Union, and they came, they just spontaneously came together and said we need to work together, and we have to work together so that maybe is a little a little part of it. And, and so it may be the need to first, for small places to gather together, and a kind of spirit of cooperation that we've inherited, I wouldn't say that it's, you know, universally experienced all the time. And, and it may be just partially good luck that that some of us have ended up in this place together. But certainly, you know Amanda Currie, you know, a great ecumenical leader, her partner and spouse, Nick Jesson, a leader with the Catholic Church. And we've had Catholic bishops who really supported their people being involved. Things have aligned.
[John Borthwick]
I wonder as well, if it's a being an Ontario person, there's a sense as well that maybe the further you are away from the what, what some might think of as the center of the universe and such entrenched ways of being and traditions and things like that, the further you are away, the little more that you can feel a little freer, go a little more rogue, do your own thing, like who's gonna know you're in Saskatchewan? Let's just do our own thing, you know?
[Sandra Beardsall]
I think you're onto something there. I felt that because I moved from, I was ministering in part time and I just finished my doctoral work in Eastern Ontario. But even in that part of Ontario, I think there's just a, there's a there's a longer history of settlers there, and, and they do become more entrenched in certain ways. And, and, yeah, I realized, you know, we talk about the big skies of Saskatchewan, and there was some sense, when I moved here, I thought, yeah, those big skies represent some kind of opportunity in some ways. I think you've hit on something there. John, yeah,
[John Borthwick]
And I'm, I'm also seeing it in, like, presbyteries and some of the leadership that's given there, where, you know, because of the realities that many churches are facing, they're trying to come up with creative ideas, whether or not the denomination, officially is catching up to some of those things. They need to do things for the sake of the people involved, and for the sake of their congregations and for the sake of their leaders as they do this. So right, yeah. Really interesting. Really interesting.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Yes, yes, it is, yeah.
[John Borthwick]
So you, I'm sorry, go ahead.
[Sandra Beardsall]
One example, apart from, you know, the congregational sharing. I'm on the board of an ecumenical chaplaincy for the University of Saskatchewan, which is Anglican United Church and Presbyterian and the Presbyterians more than pull their weight on that, you know, for that experience and we cooperate with the Lutherans, and together we, you know, we pay for the chaplain and, so necessity helps to breed that. But then, then, once you're there, you realize that that's an important ministry you want to share.
[John Borthwick]
So let's talk a little more deeply about ecumenical, shared ministries. I to be honest, in my 25 year plus tenure in congregational ministry within the Presbyterian Church in Canada, I haven't seen, but again, my experience is limited. I haven't seen too many ecumenical shared ministries that that have worked well in the context that I've sort of whenever I've intersected with them. I want to believe that there are some that have worked really well and have thrived. I assume it's mostly related to people and about sharing, not surprisingly, but I'm wondering if you might give us hope today, Sandra, that this is a thing that could actually work and could be a beautiful thing for the kingdom of God as we go down well.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Amen, brother, yes, I think a shared ministry, just to clarify is, and fortunately, in Canada, we do have a kind of common definition. The Americans don't have one. So they have these ministries, but they don't have one way to describe them. But in Canada, back in the late 70s, really, they sort of developed a common definition, which is that it's two or more denominations sharing ministry in a meaningful way, and while not but while retaining, not losing their denominational identity. So this isn't like sometimes they call themselves a Community Church, but they are. They remain grounded in covenants that they sign with their distinct denominations, and they remain grounded in those denominations, so they operate together and mutually, and they share in differing levels of sharing. But they but they consider themselves one ministry together, and, and that sharing, then, is financially beneficial. It provides a witness to the community that they're working together and, and there are lots of, well over 100 shared ministries across Canada and Presbyterians are involved in, you know, quite a few of those, about a dozen congregational ministries that Presbyterians are involved in, maybe more.
One of our challenges is keeping track, and new ones are forming more regularly, and especially in the Maritimes, where there are, you know, more Presbyterians spread more thickly on the ground. We're starting to see some more of those developing. They do thrive, so they've been thriving since, really, the late 1950s when they first got started, but in bigger ways, into the 1960s and then they started in different pockets, places where there was very sparse population, often in northern Canada, in the central regions, Northern BC, northern British, Vancouver Island, Quebec, where Anglophones were in minorities, in especially in in company towns, company towns across Northern Ontario. So, you know, those were places where they got their starts, in the 70s, they started to flesh out into the prairies and in other places. Southern Ontario is probably one the less common places to find shared ministries initially. But as you know, as life changes, those places are also finding the advantages of cooperation. So there are lots of them around, and I can tell you about a couple of them, if you'd like me to
[John Borthwick]
For sure, yeah. I'm keen to hear of some.
[Sandra Beardsall]
So here you go. Here are some, yeah, here are a couple. Here's some Presbyterians that are enjoying shared ministry. Well, one of the very earliest founded ones that still going today is in Pinawa, Manitoba. Now that's a company town. It's, it's, it's a research facility for nuclear research. And the people that founded it had been in a shared ministry in Deep River, Ontario, and then they were all being transplanted. So with them, they took not only their other expertise, but they took their desire to keep sharing in ministry together. So since 1963 Anglicans, Presbyterians, United Church, Mennonites, Baptists and Lutherans have shared ministry there. Now the Baptists kind of declined just in numbers. There weren't as many of them. And so there's they're not still formally part of the Covenant, just because there weren't enough of them. Kind of hold on to that. The Lutherans did build themselves their own church in town, so they kind of withdrew from the formal sharing. But they still share ministry over the summer, so there's still some. But the Anglican, Presbyterian united and Mennonite remain there in strong ministry. And part of what helps them to has helped them with that is they decided early on that they weren't going to build a church building. They were going to rent space and in the school, they found ways to set that up so that it would be, you know, so it looks beautiful and is amenable. And so they, they kind of save money from the get go, on that that choice.
So they're, they're there another one that's been around quite a long time that I not visited Pinawa, but I visited Chetwynd BC, in northern BC. And I don't know the exact date of their founding. It was the 1970s I believe when churches, when they were expanding into the north. Anglican, Presbyterian Lutheran and United Church. They sometimes call themselves Paul ministries. You know, Presbyterian, Anglican, united, Lutheran, Paul, P-A-U-L. They are a small church that's a that has a big heart. And they are a loving church family that's been together for many decades, when the lay people there describe for other people you know that relationship, they use the language of a marriage, and we often, I often use that in shared ministry to partnerships, close partnerships with you know, and including marriages where you know you, you don't give up your own identity, but you but you learn to share your identities and some things that you thought you were going to cling to, you find out, well actually, you know, we've developed our own tradition that's a little different from either of our places, but we still know who we are and still have our family, our family of origin, in a sense. And so Chetwynd kind of describes themselves a little bit that way they've they found ways to be together that honor their traditions and also honor their long, long time together.
A little more recently, but not that recent is, is Deer Park United Church and Calvin Presbyterian in Toronto. So two big uptown churches in Toronto. And if you don't mind me telling their origin story, it's kind of special. Yeah, so Deer Park was Deer Park Presbyterian Church in and then in 1925 as many Presbyterians, and especially in Toronto area, did they voted against, or a number of them voted against going into Union, but the church itself had voted in favor. The majority of the Deer Park congregation voted in favor, but there was a significant minority that voted against, and. So they left, and they found it around the corner and uphill Calvin Presbyterian, and so they maintained themselves as two big Toronto churches for many decades, but Deer Park fell into difficulties. They had leased some of their land to an oil company that used it as their headquarters. And in return, not only paid some rent on the land, but also gave them free heating oil, and in a giant church like that, a big old, you know, stone church, this was really crucial. Well, that company decided to move its head office to Calgary, and took with it that perk. and the church realized in as well as the general decline that was accompanying many churches at the time, they could not afford this big building anymore. They still had a they had a beautiful choir with paid soloists and lots going on, but they couldn't afford their building, and so the presbytery, the United Church, presbytery, suggested that they move in. They showed them, you know, a couple with one of the close by United churches, and they said, you know, if we do that, we'll just be absorbed. We won't be ourselves anymore. So they struggled with that. And then who came knocking at their door, but Calvin, Presbyterian, and they said, you know, we could be a shared ministry together, and you could still be Deer Park, and we can be Calvin, but we can share building together, and that will share our resources. And since we're Presbyterian United, and our worship is almost the same, we could share worship together, and so that became the solution for these people at Deer Park. And they, they tell the story of, you know, they suitably said goodbye to their building and on their having had their sort of closing service the previous week, then the next Sunday, they gathered at Deer Park, and they walked over to Calvin so they processed with some of their treasures from their communion wear and things over to Calvin church, where the Calvin symbolically opened the doors, and the people were all singing. They were singing a hymn, but they turned in their pews back to face the people coming into the church, and they made space in all their pews. So people making space in their pews always a big thing. They moved aside in their pews so that as people came down the central aisle, they could fan out into the pews and be sitting with the people of Calvin. And so they tell that story as their marriage ceremony, in a way, right how they came together. It doesn't happen easily and quickly. There was lots and lots of negotiation behind the scenes. There's lots of just mechanics around who owns what and how do we negotiate? Some of those things, they had to now, beautiful choirs to sort and I think it's taken them, it took them a while to to meld those experiences. But they're, still in action and I happen to see that they're currently looking for a United Church minister. What they have is too clergy. They can still afford on they can afford to clergy because of their status and their resources. And so they always have one Presbyterian and one United Church clergy person. And so they're looking for the United Church component just now. So, if any of your listeners know of a United Church person who would be a good fit with a Presbyterian congregation. That's a place to go. So that's another one that's more recent, in the late, 2000s 2010s, but, but still, still going strong. So those are some examples.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, that's a beautiful story that's, that's, and I love that image of making space for folks in the pews. That's so amazing, yeah, because that would be a real challenge the from what you're sharing there, I think it would be helpful for our listeners, I think to understand better. As I was listening to you, there's a sense of, I guess, are there degrees of ecumenical shared ministries? So the language of like a Campus Church was a was a term I've heard before, where we're a church that has as many, in some cases, as maybe three different worship spaces, and they would call themselves a campus, but they're basically all autonomous, and maybe a few times a year they share worship together, but there's a shared building, and they maybe even built a building with the purpose of sharing is that, is that one level of ecumenical, shared ministries?
[Sandra Beardsall]
Yes, that that, that would be kind of that one end of the spectrum, and it's not as often, because that's kind of that's expensive to purpose build, you know, if you didn't do it a long time ago, right? So that, but that happens. So yes, we always say you start somewhere and sometimes. So it depends on what the need is that sort of recognized in the community and it, people sometimes say, oh, it's only about economic need. Well, economic need is real. And it fosters other things. I did a survey a few years ago of ecumenical shared, ministries and I asked them to check off the different kinds of roles that motivations played, like economic need, desire to present a more unified ministry in the community desire to get to know each other better, be part of in our cases, United and Presbyterian, not so much this, but some Anglicans and Lutherans are part of the full communion. Agreement is that part of it? And or did you just want to share some programming together and some of that? But, and 100% of the people who responded to the survey said economic need played a role, you know. And so that's not surprising.
But then, like, 95% said that, having a unified ministry in the community was important, you know, it was also, isn't it was as important. Soit's a combination of things, and depending on so sometimes, you know, somebody's building has, has tanked. And so they're looking for a, you know, so then, then they, they can see sharing a building together, and so something like the Deer Park Calvin, where they have been, managed to maintain two clergy. That rarely happens. Usually, the impetus then is to say, well, then do we share clergy in some way? Sometimes clergy will be shared across different buildings, so where they can't afford clergy or find clergy, they'll share a minister who you know, does the service either twice a Sunday or once you know, or they go all together to one church one Sunday and the other church the other.
Right up to complete integration the one the church I served in Labrador, was Anglican and United and it and so it was an Anglican United congregation. So my congregants were officially Anglican, and United they were also other things. It was a company town, Churchill Falls, which is a power electric power town. We've heard about them recently in the news and but it was a company town where they built one church, and they said, you Christians sorted out. And there weren't people of other religions there to at the time, and or they weren't even imagining other religions. So the Anglican United congregation shared the building with the with the Catholic parish and then we had wonderful relationships across those boundaries as well. And had a bishop who was very, very amenable and a priest who only visited occasionally. And there was a lay Pastoral Worker, and I worked closely with her. We did youth work all together. We and once a month, we were given permission to share a church service together with the Catholics, and they were permitted to do that. And so that was complete integration. And so there can be ranges of everything in between.
So Pinawa the two the other two I described for you and Chetwynd, you know, they're completely integrated their worship is together. But that doesn't necessarily mean their worship is the same. Every week, often they will rotate their worship. So if you have like three often you will have two or three church denominations represented, and they'll so they'll take turns. And so you'll, you know, one Sunday is Lutheran, and the next one is Presbyterian, and the next one is Anglican. And they'll rotate those through and then sometimes the fourth Sunday is the minister's choice or something. So they, so they honor their traditions in the ways that make sense for them, and often we encourage them when they get started, to do that rotational pattern, so that people don't feel like they've suddenly been thrown into something completely different. But we also then, then that means you're learning somebody else's worship tradition, and that's a challenge. So that's something you have to learn. But then while you've given up doing the same thing every Sunday that you do in your own church you learn, we call it you know you become by liturgical. And you learn another language, another way, and people in shared ministries say they that's something that's really rich for them after they get used to it, that they can, they can communicate with God in a in a slightly different way. So, it's a variety of things. We still have places where just the building is shared. And that's often that's like, like, there's a little town in eastern Saskatchewan, where, recently, the Catholic church just couldn't afford to keep its building going. So now they share the building with the Anglican Church. And, you know, I haven't heard that there. They may do some special services together. They probably do special ecumenical things together. But of course, their liturgies generally are distinct, but that's an example of just sharing the building too.
[John Borthwick]
Does it require? I'm sensing that it would require a certain kind of leader to be able to because I'm, as you said, the unique one with deer park and Calvin is that both of them are able to call or bring on united in a Presbyterian. But I'm assuming that in many of those cases where there might be as many as three different traditions that are represented the leader who might be trained in one of the traditions, I want to be respectful, but kind of like plays Anglican or plays Lutheran on one Sunday, versus then their whatever they were raised in, or whatever they were trained in. And I guess the other piece that I'm curious about in that is it ever been necessary, or has anyone ever done something whereby they get cross trained almost, you know? I mean, I know it's just liturgy, and most of us can figure that out, but I even wonder around some of our traditions. Get a pretty, get pretty excited about, you know, hey, like you're not authorized. I mean, I remember one time an Anglican priest let me stand at the altar to co like, I'm losing the word
[Sandra Beardsall]
Co-preside, co-celebrating.
[John Borthwick]
was an Anglo Catholic, so he used some really big word. But I got to stand there, and a couple of Anglicans came up to me afterwards and said, that's a pretty big deal, like, not everybody gets to stand at the altar. And so just, just curious,
[Sandra Beardsall]
That's a very important question, and it's one that I, you know, I tried to work on all through ministry, and it was challenging in that really you do ideally, there's something that helps to train people. And I used to offer a course in it, and I offered it in different ways, and that was really helpful to people. They need some kind of education, obviously, in doing this. But before the education, they need the kind of heart for it. They need to say, I am willing to not to give up my tradition, but to another's tradition, another's language, so that I can serve them effectively.
So it's it takes a kind of an ecumenical heart, which takes me back to some of the reason, I think it's important even just to reflect on the Nicene Creed in the way that I mentioned, just because you have to ask yourself, What can I learn from somebody else that that, you know, I think I've got it all here in my own church. What can I actually, perhaps, learn and so being willing to learn helps. And then, and then it's so it's learning some of the practices. There was a fellow who was a long time shared ministry in shared ministry, a long time in northern BC, and he was interviewed after the fact, and he said he was Anglican and United. He was United Church. And he said, you know, it took me several months I of doing the Anglican liturgy, which he had been licensed to perform, until I finally felt like I was like, really praying with it. So it takes time to learn.
So one thing is to learn it and to become fluent in it so that you feel like you're really engaged in it. But the other question that you ask, and this is this is important for Presbyterians and United Church people, is that we are not in full communion with the Anglican Church. And while we would recognize their clergy and say, Sure, go ahead, preside at the table, we are not recognized our denominations are not recognized in fully. That we are not fully there's not mutual recognition. There's been a lot of work on that. United and Anglican churches have been working hard at that, trying to kind of bring ourselves closer to the possibility of communion. In the United States there, they've managed to work it out sort of thing, if they can do it. So then it's up to the Anglican bishop to at least license or get, you know, recognize the shared ministries minister to do at least the regular, like a morning prayer, what we call regular, non-Eucharistic service. And so it's at the celebration of the communion that it becomes more complicated. And any Christian can baptize. So that's not the issue. Of course, confirmation happens in the Anglican Church through the bishops. So no matter what your shared ministry, you bring in the bishop if there's an Anglican being confirmed to do the confirmation of the Anglican members. But that's a so that's a bit of a challenge in in shared ministries that include Anglicans and United or Presbyterian clergy.
[John Borthwick]
Would you be reliant on? Because from what I know of Anglicans, they have a strong tradition. I don't know what the difference is, but a strong pull for retired clergy. So would you be sort of relying on a retired clergy person to do basically the Eucharist at times, or someone to visit and do that exactly?
[Sandra Beardsall]
It's one of those. And when I was in Labrador, this community was a company town where you had to move out when you retired, because you didn't own your home, and so there were no retired people in town, so somebody had to drive three hours across a gravel road to come and give a Eucharist to the Anglicans. Now that's didn't mean they didn't get Eucharist. It's just they got the Holy Communion according to the United Church, right? And we actually started doing it every week, because Anglicans wanted it more frequently so. And there are many Eucharistic prayers or communion prayers that Anglican that United Church and Presbyterian people use, that look very similar to Anglican Eucharist. And so the people themselves, very few of them felt they were being deprived. They didn't feel like they were deprived of ministry. But in order to honor that need for, you know, Anglican Communion, this person had to drive over gravel for three hours to come and do a service. And so that's, you know that that, but that's, that is one little challenge in ministry. But it's overcome by what you say, people whom the bishop can, through their own polity, legitimately appoint to or designate to, to be a person that can visit or sitting in the congregation, who can help with that so, and the people are usually very supportive of their own clergy. And, you know, try to make all that happen with grace.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, and so it's, it's always fascinating to me, because that's the that I hold both, I honor both in the sense that in the community that I served, I served in a community here in Guelph for 21 years, and and my good Scots Presbyterians would get a little cranky every so often when we would do certain certain services together. We really tried. We worked hard to have ecumenical services at least once a year, do some pulpit exchanges and things like that. And my Scots would get a little ornery about the the church on the hill, the Roman Catholics and sometimes the Anglicans, but mostly they're picking on the church on the hill, the Basilica and, and they would typically, in a typical way, they'd say, Well, you know, like the Roman the Catholics would be welcome here for communion, but we're not welcome over there. And, and I would always say to them, you know, there's something about honoring a tradition. I said, I have a really good relationship with the priest on the hill. I imagine that if I came forward for Eucharist at a service, I imagine if it was him, he would probably give it to me. But I don't do that because I honor his tradition that says that there's something the table is broken. We're not in full communion together. And until that happens, we can't do that. And so I honor that and that, and respect him for that, because I'm also known, you know, if he's seen giving communion to me, you know, there could be trouble, and I don't want to give him that that kind of issue. So it's, it's holding those things in tension, right, that there's still these, these pieces, and even around some of the other practices within, you know, some churches have rules and regulations and things that they do that hope they hold dear in traditions. How do we honor that and respect that, and not just sort of dismiss it as like, well, we can do everything we want. It's like, I really appreciate how you're describing that in those but, those are tension points, and those are the challenges sometimes, right?
[Sandra Beardsall]
That's absolutely right, yeah. And of course, even in within our own denominations, you know, we have some of those tension points. So we have to remember that it isn't just across those boundaries, but those, those are painful boundaries, especially with the Roman Catholics, because we can take Anglican Communion with someone. I mean, we're allowed to go to the table in the Anglican Church, and they are allowed to come to our table. But it's, you know, it's that painful divide that that that hurts us all. And you know, I struggle to understand it at times, because I'm, you know, I'm out of that tradition. It says is Jesus table come on down, you know. But, I mean, I wouldn't ever say it that way in church.
[John Borthwick]
No, don't say that in Egypt.
Sandra Beardsall 56:18
Probably won't be saying much around a table in Egypt. It's the painful part of that, that actually, that the Catholics say is important, because it reminds us that we're not. There's some things we haven't worked out. So you know, what we always have to press each other on. Is, how important is this church dividing? Is this thing you know, enough to keep us from the table or from each other in some other way, you know? And that's an ongoing, you know. Big Question for ecumenical life is, What has to divide us? I mean, what has to keep us apart? Because we can't solve it. And that's ecumenically, in a global sense, we're coming much closer to one another in so many ways that you know we just have, you know we have, we just have things we haven't worked out yet.
So, but yes, thank you. I think you've described it really well that it's and just to say, most Catholic priests would not ever, uh, bar someone from the table, because that would look like a scandal of the mass. And so they would serve you, and then afterwards, call you in and say, you know, that wasn't really appropriate. And like, like you, though, when I go somewhere, it's clear that I'm a person that should know that difference, and so I do go forward, but I ask for blessing. And so that's, it's not the same, it's what we can do, right? And, yeah, and, and, you know, I, you know, we always have our points that we think, you know, we've got it all together. Why don't they just listen to us. You know, you know, every one of us harbors those things that different ways at different times, right? And we sure, and so part of the discipline of ecumenism is, is recognizing I need to know where I need to learn, as well as where I hope others will learn from my tradition.
[John Borthwick]
Well, and I even had the in congregational ministry. I had the experience one time where I had married a couple, and then they weren't really connected to they were connected to me, but not to the church that I served in Presbyterian tradition. And they, this was early days in my ministry, so it was good to have this learning so, like I could share it along the way. So they decided to have, they had a child, and then they decided to go, because one of them had sort of a background in Catholicism. So they decided to go to the Catholic Church to have their child christened. And it was a terribly painful experience for them. They were so surprised by what happened and how the priest presented it, and at least it helped to for me to hear what happened. They talked about a binder, and then they and then they said that you'll come on this special day, on this day, and you'll, you'll do this. And they said something about a marriage or a wedding. And the woman said, Pardon, like, What do you mean? Well, and then he you know, every person in ministry is their own person, so I don't know. They might have got a priest who might have been a little cranky. And he basically said, so, where did you get married? And they got married at a hotel property or something and see. And allegedly, he said, So, not on holy ground. Who married you? Oh, well, like a minister at the Presbyterian Church, right? So not a not a priest. So what you're going to do is come to this special occasion where the church will remarry you. In the eyes of the church. I know this is not everybody's a perfect ecumenist. I guess it could have been phrased a lot different. But I also I just want to honor and respect that those are the traditions of the Roman Catholic Church, I assume. And so it allowed me at least to say to couples when I was marrying them, like as the pre stuff, to sort of talk about, if you ever decide to have your child baptized your Christian and you ever go to the Catholic Church, just know that there are certain things that they would ask or might require you to do, if that's what a tradition you want to follow in some cases, not every case, but it could be bishop to bishop or priest to priest, I don't know, but yeah, just really sad.
[Sandra Beardsall]
They do have rules, actually, that that are, you know, that are wider than that. I mean, they embrace everybody, and then they like so all Catholics are under the same rules around ecumenical engagement, and then, and then, within that, each bishop can set up the pastoral norms for that. So I've never heard of that. And so it sounds like that priest was going was not following the rules. One, one thing that's helpful, though, as all so not just clergy and shared ministries, but all of us as clergy is to is to know what are the actual rules for the other churches. And you know, we have a in 1975, we signed an agreement together as churches in Presbyterian, Lutheran, United, Roman Catholic and Anglican, that we would honor the validity of each other's baptisms, so there would be no reason for a priest to interrogate any of that and, and just to say that these people are somehow invalidly Christian. Now, in this case, he said invalidly married, but we do recognize our each other as Christians. And so it's a bit of a I've never heard of anyone going through that before, and I've heard other things, but not that.
[John Borthwick]
I always say they have rules.
[Sandra Beardsall]
It's important for us to know what their rules are to in in all of our different churches, so that when people come to us and, you know, say that I can't, I'm not allowed to, it's like, I'd say, like, well, I'd like to find out about exactly what you're allowed to do, and just be sure about that, because that's painful and, yeah, and traumatizing for people.
[John Borthwick]
You know, it was because it furthered where she started asking questions about, well, in the eyes of the church, what is what are we as a couple? And then in the eyes of the church, what is our child? And that that got really messy. Anyways, yeah, the other curiosity I had regarding ecumenical shared ministries is around governance. You know, Presbyterians, we love our governance. We love our polity. We just can't get enough of it. How did, how does that get worked out? Does an ecumenical shared ministry create some kind of like standards of operating procedures. Do they be Presbyterian polity for a year and then united, and then Anglican? Or how does it all work?
[Sandra Beardsall]
Well, good question. Well, there's a there's a shared there's an ecumenical, shared ministries handbook that was put together by national church staff in the Anglican, Lutheran, United and Presbyterian churches, and they and that helps kind of say, here are the things you need to work through in terms of polity. Generally what they do is they have when you come together as a shared ministry, you do so with a covenant, and part of that covenant is to describe how you're going to just how you're going to organize yourselves. Usually you develop a like a board for the shared ministry, and that covers all the things you're going to do together. So if you're sharing the building, you know, then it's that's part of that covenant. And then you also develop, but you usually have to have some sort of committee or subgroups that that handle the things that have that come specifically to deal with the polity of your denomination. So you know, who are you going to send to presbytery, you know? And, and what do you do? About like, who go and who goes to the, you know, who goes to the Synod meetings and General Assembly, if there's someone like it, you know, and all that sort of, they so they have a combination of, so they still follow their own polity where they need to. There might be decisions that, you know, all Presbyterians have to make through the, you know, through remits, and so, you know, then the Presbyterians vote on those, you know, as a as a block within the larger part of the congregation. To some extent, those of us who have the, you know, have a lot of polity, we sort of win the day, and that there's a fair bit of polity goes into creating. A shared ministry, and others abide by it.
Now, one of my interests was I worked together with some American colleagues on this book that we together wrote, called Daring to Share. And it looks at shared ministries in the United States and Canada. And there are some terrific ones in the United States, really interesting ones. But they are there, where our shared ministry agreements might be. Well, the one that I had at Churchill Falls was two pages because it had been formed in, you know, 1971 today, they're probably more like five to 10 pages. And at the most, maybe, and then, and then, in the United States, they have one that like, here's our Constitution, and then here are our bias, covering every possible thing that you might think about. One thing that shared ministry agreements do, or should have, often the older ones don't, is, is an opting out clause. What happens if it, you know, and this American congregation that had very detailed descriptions of everything, preface that with saying, We do not ever anticipate having to end this ministry together. However, if we did have to, here's the legal. Those covenants are signed by their, what we call judicatories there. So, you know, whoever in the presbytery is responsible for overseeing, you know that congregation would be signing that it would be someone from the United Church region would be signing it, now that we have regional governments and United Church. And then, you know, and, and likewise, if it's a diocese or a Synod of the other churches, so they all sign on and, and those become the kind of operate. That's the operating manual for that, that shared ministry.
[John Borthwick]
So again, from a leadership perspective, you'd have to be open and flexible and have a bit of a sense of how this particular ministry is going to be led. Because, I mean, even thinking this the simple, sort of simple things of like in the Presbyterian Church, the moderator of the session of a church is the minister, and the United Church, the moderator or the chair of Council, is not the minister. It's right. And then in the Anglican tradition, I think there's like two wardens that the minister gets to or the priest gets to have a part of, but, but isn't technically, the wardens are kind of in charge of the day to day, or the decision making of the church, in some ways, is that fair?
[Sandra Beardsall]
At least there they have a, yeah, a significant role in the parish council. Yes, that's the kind of thing that we would hope, you know, if we could only have, a common training opportunity for people, you know, it's not just an hour, you know, but it's even if it's a like a week of training that just helps people to familiarize themselves, and then, you know, in any church, you have to learn the ways the ropes along the way, but at least to have the basics, it really helps one, the thing that people and the ministers and shared ministries complain about the most is the duplication of meetings and paperwork.
[John Borthwick]
I was fearing, oh, my goodness, you have to fulfill the Presbyterians, the United and the Anglicans, or whatever you've got. Wow, right?
[Sandra Beardsall]
And so those up there is a now, I think they that there has been, there was, and I think it may be fell by this way side, but there has been a common reporting mechanism so that all the basic material information that you would have to report to any denomination is on a common form that's been set put together by the national churches, working together in a national churches task group that does that. Shared ministries task group, and so that that helps a bit. And then it's, it's recognized that the minister can't go to every meeting of every denomination. And some you know, there has to be something done to make sure that you know if it's if I'm the Minister and it's an Anglican, and there are Anglicans there that the Anglicans are suitably represented in places where I would be permitted to attend, like Anglicans, are quite open to me attending their meetings. And even if I was the minister of Anglicans, I would be permitted to vote, except on things that had to do with their kind of, their core foundational theology and polity. So, you know, there's, there's quite a bit of hospitality around that, but there's also just, there are limits to what one or two person can do. So that's part of it.
[John Borthwick]
I always said in Guelph, where I served, that lots of the conversations that would happen, we had a gather. Gathering. It was really just to have lunch, but I sort of convened a gathering of all the people who were in the old stone churches, all the ministry leaders so the church on the hill, the Basilica, the priest came and we had the evangelical church that had purchased the United Church, and they would join us for lunch. And in our conversations, what often would transpire is sort of imagining what the future looks like. Say, what would there have been like seven, seven big stone churches in the city and two United and two Presbyterians amongst that. It was maybe more than that. Was nine. I think it was. And we would often joke that, you know, we're more likely to, in the future, to join with the United Church, or even the Baptist church, or maybe even the Anglicans, that you know, we're going to consolidate at some point, than we would with our Presbyterian brethren. Or the United Church guys were saying the same things about their United Church, and the Anglicans were actually saying this the very same thing. Yeah, we're never going to get together, but maybe we could get together with you Presbyterian someday. I'm aware that the Prairie Center for Ecumenisms website has this Ecumenical Shared Ministries Toolkit, and I think you were instrumental in that, you know, if I was a minister sitting somewhere in a community and was thinking, hey, how could I have my first conversation with the Baptists or the Anglicans or Presbyterian or whoever it is, it looks like a really amazing website with tons of stuff available. Could you say more about that? Or would this be a good first step for folks?
[Sandra Beardsall]
Well sure, I if, yeah, if you want to just figure out what the heck is this anyway, the toolkit has, it has some like PowerPoints, with text. So you could walk a congregation through a little PowerPoint, or even just a colleague, and you could walk through it and say, Okay, what is it? What? How do you get started? What kinds of things? Mainly, it's starting with conversation. And so even if so, I think the toolkit is a great way for people to kind of get some comfort in working through some of those things. But it initially starts with the conversation that you guys are already having. And I think you know that it isn't just because you know those United Church people aren't like our United Church people, but it's also neighborhoods have a character. And one of the things I love about shared Ministries is it can allow ministry to continue in a neighborhood where there might be three churches that are of different denominations, but they but they can kind of keep the keep the life going together that's more like each other than it might be like, you know, a neighborhood that's in a, you know, that's in a those people in a frame churches. What do they know about stone churches? Right? Exactly.
[John Borthwick]
If your church wasn't, if your church wasn't built in the late 1800s you don't know anything about being church, yeah, right, 1970s Oh, my goodness, no, we can't be with those people.
[Sandra Beardsall]
That's right. So, you know, but there's sometimes those demographics are different, and it also, you know, kind of can hold it, can help hold neighborhoods together. So I think that's important. But the way to do it is to just start with a conversation and you know, like the Calvin Deer Park issue, sometimes that is a less threatening conversation than being told that you should amalgamate with another Church of your denomination and probably move to their building because it's more sustainable, or whatever. And the kind of fear of losing your identity as you're absorbed even with the best of intentions, you know, whereas in a shared ministry, there's a kind of the denominational boundaries help to keep that identity not exclusive and rigid, but it holds it a little more in place. So it's a little advantage of shared ministry, if you're thinking about it. But certainly, I hope people can check out that it's pcecumenism.net and that shared ministries toolkit is a way to just get yourself a little bit familiar with some of the details it's got. So it's got some stuff that's like, yeah, PowerPoints. It's got the shared ministries handbook is there? There are. We're increasingly adding things to the to the archives. This afternoon, we're recording some interviews with people in shared ministries that are going to be put up there to show, from the practitioners point of view, what it's like. So I encourage people to have a look at that.
[John Borthwick]
That’s certainly a conversation. I'm even seeing more and more as there's models being put out there now around, for lack of a better expression, like a cathedral model. All So, and we actually used to talk about that in Guelph as well. You know, there'll be one Cathedral Church that's the Christian Church Cathedral. Maybe there have to be two, because the Roman Catholic Church will still have to have its Basilica, but, but there'll be one Cathedral Church where we do cathedral kind of worship. But then there'll be these offshoots elsewhere, regionally or within, like you say, neighborhoods, but even listening to some, I get to go and visit other churches regularly. And you know, sometimes hearing how folks in a rural community are feeling about those conversations when they're held only within the denominational space. So a presbytery having a conversation with a variety of churches, and saying, you know, we need to have less churches, and them having that sense of losing their identity, or what do those people know? And to a guy who's been mostly suburban and urban in most of my life, it's always interesting, but, just like you said, neighborhoods have their own flavor, but in rural communities, it's like, you know, what do those people in the big city, which really isn't, it's a small it's just a slightly larger town. What are those people in that town know about our way of being here in this smaller community? And so, yeah, when you think about the in those smaller communities, there's probably 2,3,4,5, different Christian churches. You know, when are they having their conversations that could really be meaningful to them, to share the continuance of their witness in those smaller communities, as opposed to just consistently saying, we need to close that one down, that one down, and everybody has to go to the bigger town or to the city or whatever that looks like.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Well, actually, there is that model was developed in the late 80s in a in Milton Keynes, England, and it was sort of a post war built town, which you don't find that many of in England, you know, you usually, they're very historic. But they built a cathedral called Christ the Cornerstone that belonged to everybody it was so it was including the Catholics. And then, as you say, then, then had shared ministries out into the into the community, the various surrounding communities. But they Yeah, so it's a possibility. It really happened.
[John Borthwick]
Is it still going?
Sandra Beardsall
As far as I know, I have not, as you were speaking, I thought I should have checked, I should have checked out to see if the Catholics were still part of it. I haven't heard and haven't checked it recently, but I visited it number of years ago, and it was still there as a as a cathedral for everyone.
[John Borthwick]
It'll be homework for our Ministry Forum audience to check out, if I check it out, Christ the Cornerstone Church in Milton Keynes, yeah, still a thing that's amazing. Well, as we wrap up today, Sandra, there's a question I asked Amanda and also Jerry Pillay, and I think I have a suspicion of how you're going to answer, but I'd love to hear your thoughts we hear so often, or at least I do, that the Christian church is really going to be a church in the future without denominations around those that lunch table with the variety of different flavors of denominations. Often, these leaders were often saying things like, you know, nobody in our church cares about denominations anymore. You know, we could all just be the same. It would all be just fine. Do you personally envision a future like that? Is that even something you think of and as a passionate advocate of ecumenism, what might be lost again, I have some suspicions if we move in a direction of just devaluing our denominational heritage, how would you answer that question?
[Sandra Beardsall] Well, it's an interesting question. I, I'm also a church historian, so I, I like it when people remember history and honor it in appropriate ways. So you can let go of the things you don't need anymore, too. I think, I think it wouldn't, I don't know. I do not try to imagine a future with no, you know, imagine no religion. Because I think that's well, the future is in God's hands. So what's faithful today? Well, faithful today is honoring what you've been given and treasuring what you know of your own faith. And so people may say they don't care about denominations, and at some level, they don't, until something's taken away from them that they realize they treasure. So I don't find that people are as anti-denominational as they might think they are. I think what they think of is bureaucracy, and, you know, too many meetings and things that they think would waste their time. So I think more importantly, is sitting down together at that table and sharing the gifts. So, you know, the sharing is, the is the is the important piece for me, sharing doesn't mean that, you know, everything goes into the same stew pot and you. Just stir it up, and then it maybe tastes good, or tastes kind of bland, you know, it's, it's figuring out how to, how to learn from one another and appreciate each other without, you know, without demanding that the other kind of lose their lose something that's of real value to them. There may be a time when, then when there's nothing that we don't, we don't all agree on if it's that, if that comes, because that's how we have, that's how the Holy Spirit has moved in us. Well, that's great. And I'm always at for closer and closer sharing and but, but I do believe that that's that it's not that the goal is not that we just become one homogenous thing, but that we become that we celebrate diversity and the unity and diversity somehow that we can gather together.
[John Borthwick]
So yeah, beautiful, is there anything I haven't asked that you were hoping I would today.
[Sandra Beardsall]
I think you've, you've covered so many things well, I think that's great, John. And I guess my only puzzle was you said that you know you were, you weren't sure about some of this shared ministry stuff, and yet you, you really embrace the spirit of it. So, so maybe people, maybe people need to hear that you don't have to have it all figured out, in order to explore it, you just need to be kind of curious and open to the other and see where that takes you.
[John Borthwick]
Yeah, for sure, and you certainly have given me hope and inspiration for this, this ongoing idea and reality of ecumenical shared ministry. I just want to offer my thanks to you for having this conversation with me today. This has been great. I've learned a ton. So appreciate that, and thank you for all the work you've done and continuing to sort of spread the word and encourage folks to engage in this kind of really interesting ministry that could be for some I think it would be an amazing gift to be able to share that the such the variety and the diversity that comes in leading a space like that.
[Sandra Beardsall]
Well, thank you, John. I really appreciate this podcast that you do and how you assist people in ongoing ministry, and I'm delighted that you invited me to be part of it. So thank you.
[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 at 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. May you be well in body, mind and spirit, and may you be that peace.