Continuing a series of blogs heading round the 32 qualifying countries in the 2022 World Cup - I will pick out one church in each one. I am not going to choose only churches that are to my liking. This is an exploration not a recommendation! To see all in the series select the label 'World Cup Churches' below.
My disclaimer 'I am not going to choose only churches that are to my liking' has a special emphasis this blog as we look at a church in Canada. Canada is not really an Association Football nation - Ice Hockey is the thing. And this blog's church is not really a church - but anyway, here goes . . .
The United Church of Canada is the largest Protestant Denomination in Canada, albeit shrinking like the Arctic ice pack. Formed chiefly of the Methodists and Presbyterians it began life as a large, generally evangelical and evangelistic denomination in 1925. In the years following World War II and especially in the 1960s the denomination embraced ever more liberal positions on everything from sexual ethics to basic Christian doctrine. It prides itself on its breadth rather than its truth, though of course not every church or church member is as spiritually weak as the central core.
Yet even when you officially believe next to nothing, there is always someone who can believe less. Welcome to West Hill United Church, Scarborough and Margaret the Minister.
In charity, I may find Gretta (Margaret) a charming companion over a coffee. What has made her famous/notorious (since 2001) is that she is an atheist - and remains as minister of her church (albeit it on extended medical leave at the time of this blog). She has come out and, er, not come out.
Now we're not talking about someone with a few doubts, or to whom God is a mysterious inspirational life force. Neither are we talking about a building intended for a Humanist Assembly or a Universalist 'Church' with a cloud of unknowing where God may or may not be. We're talking full-on North Korean, Richard Dawkinesque atheism: atheism, if you like, with attitude in a church building of Canada's largest Protestant denomination.
There was, some time ago, a debate in the United Church as to whether it was suitable for Gretta to continue as a minister, but in the end it was felt that it was okay. (Breadth, remember?).
You may wonder how, without hypocrisy, Gretta could lead Christian hymns and prayers to God-Who-Is-Not. Be assured that she does not - and her transparency about her unbelief is far from hypocritical. Familiar traditional hymn-tunes have words of self-realisation and community discovery, and prayers are quiet reflective thoughts to ponder.
Hypocritical it isn't, but the pointlessness of it all is painful to consider - an unbelief system offering nothing to someone seeking God: a religious setting and format offering nothing to a thinking Atheist. It shares its spiritual prospects with Canada's prospects of winning the World Cup - about zero.
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