By Leyla Valois
Local Christians are tearing down the walls between Kamloops churches and bringing what they call “revolutionary faith” into a once-traditional religious community.
In a city where Christians used to define themselves by their denominational affiliations — Baptists were Baptists, Anglicans were Anglicans — a rise in local interdenominational services has once cut-and-dried denominations blending together, free of labels.
Pastor Henry Devries (right) grooves to contemporary Christian rock at Sahali Fellowship along with recently baptised congregation member Joey Tjepkema, 17.
“Denominational loyalty is in the process of going down the tubes,” said Pastor Henry Devries of Sahali Fellowship (SF), a Christian Reformed church in Kamloops. “People now pick churches based on their own comfort.”
Many members of the SF congregation have come from several different institutions, including the United Church, the Evangelical Church and the Roman Catholic Church. The Christian Reformed Church, which was brought to Canada by Dutch Calvinists in the early 1950s and now has more than 1,000 congregations across North America, prides itself on its diverse family, which also includes Orthodox and Anglican patrons.
Other local churches such as the Kamloops United Church and the Kamloops Alliance Church have also opened their arms to congregational members from various religious backgrounds.
This denominational fusion is a trend that has spread across Canada during the past 17 years.
According to a Statistics Canada 2001 census report, only 72 per cent of Canadians identified themselves as Roman Catholic or Protestant, compared with 80 per cent a decade earlier.
But the percentage of people who defined themselves as Christian, without specifying a denomination, has more than doubled during that time from 353,122 to 780,400 individuals, one of the largest percentage increases among all major religious groups.
Some people are simply stripping away denominational labels, while others are shying away from religion altogether.
The same census reported that the percentage of Canadians who said they had no religion increased from 12 per cent in 1991 to 16 per cent in 2001.
According to Devries, churches that have held on to traditional preaching methods instead of moving with the times have suffered a decline in Sunday attendance. Members are trading in rigid services for more modern sermons.
“People don’t have an interest in going to church anymore because they are tired of being manipulated,” Devries said. “There has been a huge growth in spirituality in society, but people will go everywhere but the church to get it.
“I think we’re in an upcoming generation that has seen the emptiness of religion and of materialism and that none of those things have provided true meaning to life,” he said, adding until religions provide messages free of judgment — of individuals, of lifestyles and of other religions — people will keep on walking away.
While the core principles of Christianity don’t change, Devries said, it is vital to modernize some of the messages from the Bible, applying them to life in the 21st century.
“It’s important to stay relevant,” agreed Kellie Gill, SF’s associate pastor. “Otherwise you’re presenting an ancient message that today’s society doesn’t value.”
And as culture changes, so must the church. What was not socially accepted 200 years ago, such as ordained women and same-sex marriage, are becoming more mainstream in the church because of their acceptance in Canadian society.
The United Church of Canada, for example, not only recognized the ordination and commission of homosexuals in its church since 1980, but also fully supported the Government of Canada when the same-sex marriage law was proposed in 2005.
In addition, it has accepted women as ministers in its churches for decades. Members of the Kamloops United Church could not be more pleased.
“We had a woman minister come a few times and she was marvellous — her sermons were very uplifting,” Kamloops United Church member Jean Kingsbury said. “She was as good as, or better, than any man.”
Kingsbury, who was born in 1919, grew up in Toronto and attended an Anglican all-girl school, but worshipped at a United Church. She and husband Tom moved to Kamloops in 1957, bringing their Christian affiliation with them.
They attended the local United Church and were pleasantly surprised to find that while the teachings were basically the same in the West as in the East, other features, such as the prevailing dress code, were more contemporary. Kingsbury was delighted to trade in her floor-length skirt for a nice pair of slacks — almost as thrilled as she was to surrender her little white gloves.
However, clothing was not the only modernized facet of this new church. Services were less stuffy and sermons more relevant.
“I love the fact that people took part in the service,” Kingsbury said. “Only the clergy took part before.”
As the years passed, the Kingsbury family got more involved in the church. Tom helped design and erect the new church building in 1981 and, though her husband is now deceased, Kingsbury, 88, rarely misses a service.
She takes pride in the advancements made by the United Church of Canada, but is disappointed some churches, and even some congregation members, are not on board.
“We’re always on the cutting edge of everything, you know, and we take a lot of flack for it,” she said. “It’s tough because people get upset and leave when they disagree with the changes — but that’s progress, I guess.”
The United Church of Canada was formed in 1925 when various denominations — Methodist, Presbyterian and Congregational — joined under a new name: United.
Kingsbury’s sister Doe Hamilton, who attends an Anglican church in Ontario, said she wishes her church would advance as quickly as Kingsbury’s.
“I think the changes are mostly good, but many of the people in our little church just try not to rock the boat,” Hamilton said. “We can’t afford to lose people.”
Both Kingsbury and Hamilton agree changes need to be made for the message — a Christian message — to continue being heard.
Eric Villeneuve, chair of university preparation at Thompson Rivers University, sees things a little differently.
Raised in Gatineau, Quebec, Villeneuve was brought up in the Roman Catholic faith and has attended Catholic Church services in Europe, North America and Africa. He said he learned more from the Catholic priests in Zimbabwe than he ever did in Quebec.
Over the years, however, he found himself disagreeing with several of the Catholic teachings.
“There is always an emphasis on what makes us different from Protestants rather than what makes us the same,” Villeneuve said. “In my core beliefs, I see different denominations as different ways to worship.
“I don’t see them as fundamentally different from one another — it’s just a different way to relate with God.”
Villeneuve now lives in Kamloops with his wife and 13-year-old twins and, though the family has chosen to worship at Sahali Fellowship, Villeneuve often finds himself going back to his roots and attending services at Our Lady of Perpetual Help, a Catholic Church on the North Shore.
“I don’t think I could ever completely stop going to Catholic Church,” he said. “I don’t believe the Catholic Church is the only church, but it’s in me.”
Though Villeneuve has come to know Sahali Fellowship as part of his family, he maintains a respect for the Catholics’ traditional ways, referring to the sombre services as “almost meditative.”
Villeneuve is all for uniting Christians, but he strongly believes denominations still have their place in society.
“Each person has to find a place of worship that enables them to connect with God,” he said. “That’s the beauty of having so many denominations.
“Everyone has a different approach to life—you just can’t have a one-church-fits-all.”
