Re Letters, Moving Towards Creative Change, October
I remember very clearly Rev. Cheol Soon Park’s sermon — its vision, its passion, its Reformed and reforming faithfulness! Yet as a denomination the Presbyterian Church in Canada has dropped over the past 15 years by an average of 2,500 to 3,000 professing members each year, according to the statistics in the Acts and Proceedings. Our institution is dying off.
Sadly, many in leadership positions, both clergy and lay, lack the vision or the courage to embrace Rev. Park’s inspiring words. Clergy are more concerned with pensions than prophetic leadership, lay persons more concerned with revisiting church memories of the 1970s or 50s than seeking spiritual relevance for seekers in a contemporary context. Some colleagues have suggested to me that perhaps we need to embrace a palliative care approach to our churches and our denomination, avoiding change, allowing our church to live out its existence and die comfortably. Is this really what the gospel of Christ summons forth from us? Is this what God has in store for Presbyterians?
