Church finds amazing grace in getting evicted
VANCOUVER, BC—In September, the parishioners of St. John's Shaughnessy Anglican Church obeyed a court order to vacate their building. At the time, Krista Freibel admits she had "very mixed emotions" about leaving the place where her family had worshiped for over 20 years. Three months later, though, she has just one lingering regret.
"I suppose we miss the organ, because the organ we have at the new location isn't as good, and we've got a terrific organist," Freibel says.
The church now meets at Oakridge Adventist Church. And it has a new name—St. John's Vancouver.
The relocation marks the end of a long and divisive struggle with the Diocese of New Westminster over its decision in 2002 to bless the unions of same-sex couples.
In 2009, St. John's and three other parishes quit the Anglican Church of Canada and joined the new Anglican Network in Canada. This sparked a court battle with the diocese over who rightfully owned their church properties. In the end, the diocese won.
Yet because of being forced to move, associate minister Daniel Gifford believes the church has actually gained more than it lost. He says the people are more united than ever—just about everyone has stayed—while their faith is deeper then ever.
"We've had to trust God in a way that we never have before—and look at what's happened," he says. "To provide a place a mile-and-a-half away that has the exact seating capacity of our last church is remarkable in a city like Vancouver."
As well, Freibel says their Adventist hosts "were able to accommodate all of our weekly ministries. We do everything at the Oakridge location except have our offices there."
And as the name-change suggests, the transition has also helped the church connect better with the wider community.
"We've experienced a great deal of support from churches of other denominations praying for us, but also offering us their facilities for things like weddings or special services that wouldn't work in our present facility," says Gifford.
"As a result, we feel like we're caring for our city more than we did before, and we have a deeper relationship with other Christian churches."
That sense of caring even extended to the people who would be moving into St. John's Shaughnessy after them. Before they left, the departing congregation cleaned the building and wrote welcoming messages on small canvases.
"We had a motto we were trying to live by—'Bless, serve and witness,'" says Freibel. "We specifically chose that, because we didn't want people to fall into bitterness towards what was coming behind us at the Shaughnessy location."
Compounding their stress was not being allowed to take with them most of what makes their worship uniquely Anglican. Yet many responded by volunteering to construct a lot of what they needed themselves, including 167 kneelers that are set up and taken away each Sunday.
"It was quite remarkable," says Neil Stopforth, who coordinated the various projects.
"We really wanted to move as much of the service style and the esthetic from one building into the other, so that the parishioners could feel at home as much as possible."
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