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Historic Victoria congregation unites with sister congregation |
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3 October 2012
Victoria, BC – Sunday, October 7 marks the official celebration and launch of a new 350-member Anglican congregation with roots deep in BC’s history. While this congregation is new, its two founding churches have been around for awhile – one dating back to 1874.
After a year of discussion, prayer and a growing partnership, the people of Christ the King Anglican Church and Church of Our Lord joined together believing that united their ministries would be strengthened and extended. The two founding congregations, while in separate dioceses, were both members of the Anglican Church in North America which was formed three years ago to unite Biblically faithful Anglicans from divergent backgrounds throughout Canada and the USA. This uniting of local congregations in Victoria reflects a maturing trend in the ACNA to reorganize structurally for the strengthening of local ministry.
With the blessing of Bishop Charles Dorrington of the Reformed Episcopal Church, the united congregation chose to be under the Anglican Network in Canada while retaining the historic Church of Our Lord name. The clergy transferred into the Anglican Network in Canada earlier this summer. Church or Our Lord’s rector of 15 years, the Reverend Dr Rod Ellis will serve as co-rector together with the Venerable Ron Corcoran, who has been Christ the King’s rector since its inception, assisted by the Reverend Peter Umland and numerous support staff.
As a strengthened, united congregation, Church of Our Lord is already growing and revitalizing its ministries to better serve the community. While existing ministries continue, new ministries have launched. Already, a ministry known as Living Edge has begun in the Quadra Village area at the CDI College where Christ the King once met. Living Edge is a forming church congregation, comprised of about 50 parishioners from the old Christ the King Anglican Church and other community members, which is seeking to meet a real need for disenfranchised members of the Quadra community. Three times per week the Living Edge volunteers provide bags of groceries to 350-500 community members who are in need. Sunday worship services are held at 4:30pm followed by supper.
Another Anglican Network in Canada church plant known as The Table meets in Church of Our Lord’s building every other Sunday afternoon. The Table is a youthful, innovative church plant which launched about two years ago and now has about 130 members, mostly students, young professionals and young families. More information is available on The Table website: www.tablechurch.ca.
The October 7, Sunday commissioning and celebration service will begin at 10:30am at Church of Our Lord, 626 Blanshard St in downtown Victoria. For more information see the Church website: www.churchofourlord.org or www.ctkac.ca.
Contacts:
The Reverend Dr Rod Ellis
Phone 250 383-8915
Email rector@churchofourlord.org
The Venerable Ron Corcoron
Phone 250 383-8915
Cell 250 818-1187
Email rector28@shaw.ca
Backgrounder
About the founding parishes
Church of Our Lord (Reformed Episcopal Church Diocese of Western Canada and Alaska) was founded in 1874. The congregation was formed on October 29, 1874, led by the Reverend Edward Cridge – an important figure in Victoria’s history – and included many of Victoria's pioneer families. The church building – which is of architectural interest and a designated National Historic Site – stands on land donated by Sir James Douglas, the colonial Governor who is often referred to as 'the Father of British Colombia". Sir James also donated the Thomas Appleton organ, built in the 1820s, which is believed to be the oldest organ in North America still used for worship services.
Christ the King (Anglican Network in Canada) – Christ the King was formed in February 2009 as a parish in the Anglican Network in Canada when 95 per cent of an Anglican Church of Canada congregation voted to leave that Church, convinced that it was abandoning historic Christian teachings, including the authority of Scripture. For the past two years, Christ the King parishioners have worshipped in rented facilities in the Quadra Village area of Victoria.
About the founding dioceses
Reformed Episcopal Church Diocese of Western Canada and Alaska – The Reformed Episcopal denomination was founded in 1873 as an Anglican Church that sought to be faithful to historic Christian teaching and Anglican practice at a time when many in mainstream Anglican churches in North America where straying from this teaching. In 2009, the dioceses of the Reformed Episcopal Church, including its Diocese of Western Canada and Alaska, united with other like-minded churches, including the Anglican Network in Canada, to found the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).
Anglican Network in Canada – The Anglican Network in Canada numbers 67 parishes, church plants and forming congregations with more than 4000 parishioners in church on an average Sunday. Members of the Anglican Network in Canada are committed to remaining faithful to the established teaching of Holy Scripture and historic Anglican doctrine and to ensuring that orthodox Canadian Anglicans are able to remain in full fellowship with their Anglican brothers and sisters around the world. The Anglican Network in Canada was founded as an ecclesial structure in 2007 and became a founding diocese in the Anglican Church in North America.
About the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA)
The Anglican Church in North America unites into a single Church some 100,000 Anglicans in nearly 1000 congregations – organized into 22 dioceses and 3 dioceses-in-formation. The ACNA is an emerging Province in the global Anglican Communion. It was founded in 2009, under the leadership of Archbishop Robert Duncan, at the request of global Anglican leaders whose churches represent 70 per cent of active Anglicans around the world.
The ACNA’s mission is “Reaching North America with the Transforming Love of Jesus Christ”. It has been growing by about three churches per week since its inception and has set itself the goal of planting 1000 new churches within its first five years – primarily through reaching unchurched North Americans with the life-transforming Good News of Jesus Christ.
Members of the ACNA are in the mainstream, both globally and historically, of Christianity – the Biblically-faithful way of following Jesus and being part of the “One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church”. As Anglicans, this orthodoxy is defined by and centered on the Church’s classic formularies – the Book of Common Prayer, including the Ordinal, and the Thirty-nine Articles – which all point back to the authority of the Holy Bible and articulate foundational principles of the Anglican tradition throughout the world.
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