Two local Anglicans have important tales to tell

• Ed Hird: Battle for the Soul of Canada, 2006
• Julie H. Ferguson: Sing a New Song, Dundurn, 2006

BOTH of these books focus on Canada, but they are grounded in B.C. - and have international implications.

Ed Hird is a conservative Anglican pastor who has been a key player in the never-ending same-sex debate which has so preoccupied the Diocese of New Westminster.

Hird tells his personal faith journey, and the tale of how he and his congregation made the wrenching decision to leave their building and property with the diocese, and join the Anglican Coalition in Canada.

Lorne Gunter, columnist for the National Post, put it well when he said: "I expected Battle for the Soul of Canada to be a political book - a book about the battles of plucky little St. Simon's Church in North Vancouver to adhere to a biblically-inspired faith in the face of an increasingly secular (and hostile) church hierarchy. Instead, I discovered a wonderful primer on keeping faith in an increasingly secular (and hostile) world, filled with inspiring, joyful and practical examples from the lives of spiritual people."

And so it is. Yet Hird's folksy, upbeat approach incorporates a prophetic message - not strictly political perhaps, but Gunter's is just one of 42 endorsements for the book, many by conservative Anglicans worldwide. These elements are woven together with a study of the Book of Timothy, which provided "the skeleton upon which this book is built."

Hird says that "in many ways, Timothy has the personality profile of Canada: gentle, somewhat insecure and easily rejected. Yet Paul saw that this unlikely individual had the potential to be a great leader . . . We can be God's Timothy's, if we will only humble ourselves before the Lord."

Hird is at his best telling stories. He has discovered some impressive Christians buried in Canadian history.

He offers many anecdotes of faith-filled historical figures such as Colonel Moody, who prevented our province being annexed by the U.S. in B.C.'s first war, then gathered 40 miners and led worship from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer. Among the others are explorer David Thompson; pioneer settler and writer Catharine Parr Trail; and Frederick Seymour, first governor of the united B.C. colony.

My favourite is William Howland. As a young entrepreneur, he was led to Christ by his Anglican priest - and the change was immediately apparent. "Night after night, Howland visited the slums, going from house to house, and reaching out to the poor, the sick, the alcoholic."

His reputation for good works led to him being chosen mayor of Toronto in 1885. He promptly installed a 12-foot banner which read: "Except the Lord Build the City, the Watchman Wakes but in Vain."

Before long, Toronto was nicknamed 'Toronto the Good' - a sobriquet seldom heard these days.

Sing a New Song offers a well-written portrait of four Anglican leaders, though the subtitle - 'Portraits of Canada's Crusading Bishops' - more accurately might have been 'Portraits of My Favourite B.C. Bishops.'

Julie Ferguson, who attends St. John the Apostle Church in Port Moody, has chosen four bishops from B.C. to represent Canada. Why? To start with, Bishop Michael Ingham's international recognition related to the same-sex issue would appeal to any biographer.

"Ingham definitely had reached celebrity status between 2000 and 2003," she says. "The media loved him. Ingham 'on the cover' meant sales."

Ferguson may have worked backwards from Ingham, who is granted 120 pages, while the others - George Hills, David Somerville and Douglas Hambidge - come in at 60 pages apiece. The three earlier bishops are appetizers; Ingham is the main dish, with considerable focus on the same-sex issue.

Sing a New Song is not hagiography, but occasionally it comes close. "In his pursuit of social justice," Ferguson says, Ingham is "as unyielding as a rock, as steadfast as a mountain, and has the patience of Job."

Ferguson writes that she arrived "at a liberal position on the great issues that beset these bishops," and selected as her subjects those "who, by pushing the envelope of equality rights in Canada, became mirrors of, or change agents for, society's attitudes."

She was supplied with an office by Ingham, from time to time, and had the living bishops (all but Hills) read over the chapters written about them.

Does any of this lessen the value of the book? Not too much, as long as it is kept in mind. Ferguson does a fine job of reminding us of important chapters of Anglican - and B.C. - history.

George Hills, appointed in 1859 as B.C.'s first Anglican bishop, seems to have been a faithful, steadfast man of his time - though there's not much sign of the conventionally-minded cleric 'pushing the envelope of equality.'

His main virtue - it would appear from Sing a New Song - was that he withstood a challenge from his dean, Edward Cridge. Hills was Anglo-Catholic, while Cridge was strongly Protestant. Ferguson describes evenhandedly "Cridge's obstinacy and Hill's unbending attitude."

Cridge, after defying his superior, was forced out of Christ Church in 1874. He joined the Reformed Episcopal denomination and formed Church of Our Lord, also in Victoria, taking most of the congregation with him. There are echoes of the current situation between Ingham and the churches which have left the Diocese of New Westminster.

David Somerville thrived in the male-oriented, Anglo-Catholic St. James Church in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside, but eventually presided over the first ordination of women in the Diocese of New Westminster, an innovation he firmly supported (see page 12).

Douglas Hambidge comes across well. A highlight in his life - and the book - is the description of his adoption by the Nisga'a into their raven family at a reception following his consecration as bishop in northern B.C.

Ferguson says Hambidge was named 'Wal'aks Im Kran Dadils,' or a leader, and presented to his new adoptive mother. Hambidge told Ferguson: "I frankly thought it was just a nice way of welcoming a new bishop, and I really didn't expect to hear another word about it."

But when Hambidge was asked to perform a marriage for one of his new mother's 'sisters,' he wore a Nisga'a blanket for the event. As he entered the church, "people in the pews began weeping . . . Hambidge was unaware then that the blankets had been banned by the government and the church for about 70 years."

This adoption of the blanket "signified a major turning point in his relationship with the Nisga'a . . . He learned of their deep conviction that they were the church, the Body of Christ" and "absorbed their worries about the politics of the land settlements they were facing." He has pushed the envelope on behalf of native people ever since.

- Flyn Ritchie

December 2006