Rev. DeCourcey Rayner was the right man at the right job at the right time. A minister and a journalist he helmed the Record through the turbulent 1960s and ’70s. His magazine never shied away from the times. And, he wasn’t always loved for it.
Rev. Dr. Roberta Clare of St. Andrew’s Hall, Vancouver, knew him in her undergraduate years at University of Toronto. She wrote this remembrance of him in an email: “I was editor-in-chief of the Varsity in its centennial year and threw a huge banquet/party at Hart House. DeCourcy was a former editor-in-chief and showed up with Wayne and Shuster, also former editors. We kept in touch and DeCourcy became my mentor when I entered Knox College. He was a maverick in his time at the Varsity and we shared the dubious honour of being editors who were threatened with impeachment. Both of us were rather proud of the fact that we survived the turbulent waters of newspaper politics and actually fulfilled our terms! DeCourcy encouraged me to keep writing and was delighted when I began to write for the Record in the 80s.”
Armour Heights church in Toronto has a fund in Rayner’s name with the purpose of encouraging the church’s seminarians to think and write in a popular way for a general audience. In short to do for others what Rayner did for Clare.
This legacy is worked out through a contest. The Record staff concocts a question which students at the three colleges — Presbyterian College, Montreal; Knox College, Toronto; and, St. Andrew’s Hall — are encouraged to answer in the form of a short magazine article.
This year the participants were asked to meditate upon these two letters published in the Record.
WWJRead?
by Adrian C. van Draanen, Richmond, Ont.
March 1, 2010After considerable thought, and with trepidation, I am writing my first letter ever to the editor of the Record. I feel somewhat out of place in this company as I am not as learned or eloquent as the other letter writers are.
Does Jesus read the Presbyterian Record?This question occurred to me after reading the December issue. I could not help but wonder what Jesus’ reaction would be if he read what his followers were doing. Jesus left us with instruction to bring good news to the poor, to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to prepare for the kingdom of God. Although many of his followers have done that, it seems that today the need to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to bring good news to the poor, is still as great, if not greater, than 2,000 years ago.
In the Letters section I noticed that writer-A had replied to something that writer-B had said, and writer-C found this depressing. Writer-A now apologizes to writer-C for causing him to be depressed. Something about universalism. Another letter writer wants to know if the subtitutionary theory has any bearing on present reality.
I read one of the feature articles; no easy job. Things like “the characteristic of the preaching event,” “participates in an incarnational event,” or “making a sermon an incarnational creature of grace,” tend to slow me down. I agree with the article author that it may sometimes seem difficult to believe that God Himself is present in human preaching. So true! Not just difficult to believe, impossible to believe! I think I may have heard close to 4,000 sermons and some were so full of the preacher’s own importance, wit, cleverness, rhetoric, drama, that there just was no room for God.
Then I came to the Features section, where I read about ignoring the subtlety of Trinitarian doctrine, about Jesus’ being truly divine, but not wholly divine, about unfleshed and enfleshed, incarnate and discarnate.
Would Jesus know what these authors are talking about? Would he care? And if he is not confused yet, he certainly will be after reading two articles about the use of the people’s money. In the first article (Building Churches) he reads that “the relationship the parishioners have with their buildings is the most important.” In the second article (A House Not Made With Hands) he reads that “God has specifically commanded us to assist the poor, but He never told Christians to build even a small chapel, let alone spend money on one instead of them.”
Not much has changed in 2,000 years. There are still people who do and people who say. I believe there are many more people who do than one would think from reading the Record. I believe that those who feed the hungry and clothe the naked deserve a much more prominent place in the Record, than do the scholars and their debates. I also believe that it would make the Record easier and more enjoyable to read, and that it would give a truer picture of the church. Imagine Jesus reading the Presbyterian Record!
Concerned About the Record
by Rev. Doug Swanson, Salmon Arm, BC
February 1, 2010It concerns me deeply that a significant number of the members of my congregation are discontinuing their subscriptions to the Record. Many are rightly concerned with what passes for theology in the pages of a magazine that most of us believe ought to be upholding the Reformed teachings and standards of our denomination.
Dr. McLelland’s theological/philosophical discourses which appear to place the Christian faith as one of many belief systems that orbit inside some overarching sphere of greater truth, is disconcerting, to say the least. Zander Dunn’s universalism, given that he is an ordained minister within the PCC, is also troubling.
I may be wrong, but the Record appears to be endorsing and even promoting positions on human sexuality that are incongruent with our denomination’s statements regarding the same.
These are just several of the ways we perceive our denominational publication to be straying from God’s truth and from credible Christian witness in the world. I will continue to read the Record in hopes of better things, and in appreciation of contributors such as David Webber, Calvin Brown, John Vissers and others.
Three submissions were received and adjudicated by van Draanen and Record staff. (Swanson was regrettably not available to participate.) Of the winning entry van Draanen wrote, “It caught my attention right away and it held my attention to the end. It uses short sentences and easy to understand and appropriate illustrations.”
The session of Armour Heights will send generous cheques to the participants.
As always, thank yous are due to the participants (two from Knox, one from PC) and the college staff for distributing the contest. To Armour Heights for their financial generosity. To DeCourcey Rayner for his legacy. And to van Draanen (who was very generous in his time and efforts to adjudicate) and Swanson and others who engage in a (sometimes heated) conversation in this magazine every month. Or as one of the entrants wrote, “That these letters would be written, published and written about again is a testament to the democratic values that makes the PCC a place where people with a spectrum of views can share God’s grace and work together to create good news stories that will hopefully grace the pages of future editions of the Record.” – Andrew Faiz
On Track, by Scott Flemming (winner)
Sharing God’s Grace, by Heather Anderson (runner-up)
Faith Seeking Understanding, by Kathleen Sorensen (runner-up)
