Download PDF "Vicki McPhee: Reflections on One Order of Ministry" I recognized my calling to diaconal ministry in my early thirties. While I was aware that there were two streams of ministry in the United Church of Canada, I did not fully appreciate the differences...

Download PDF "Dale Skinner: Reflections on One Order of Ministry" Ministry, it seems, is as much a matter of identity as it is a matter of function.  There is a great deal in the “One Order” proposal that speaks to this impact of identity in the church’s understanding...

Download PDF "Catherine MacDonald: Reflections on One Order of Ministry"             I write this both from the perspective of someone who spent many years denying a call to ordained ministry, one who sat in the pews for a number of years, and one who ultimately...

Download PDF "Jane Johnson: Reflections on One Order of Ministry" I had no idea my colleagues’ pain ran so deep.  I had little idea that I was exacerbating it, just by working under the privilege of being ordained.             During a break in the debate over the...

Download PDF "Angelika Piché : Reflections on One Order of Ministry" The Statement on Ministry in The United Church of Canada (2012) highlighted the need to re-think ministry: The church is about God’s mission in the world. Therefore the Holy Spirit continually calls...

Download PDF "John Lawson: Reflecting on One Order of Ministry" Imagine with me the exiles – refugees – trudging away from the smoldering ruins of the Jerusalem temple after the Babylonian victory of 587 BC. Among the group is a whole cadre of people who managed and...

Download PDF "Bruce Gregersen: A History of the One Order Remit"   The processes that have led to the development of the One Order Remit cover a decade of ministry studies in The United Church of Canada. As the lead staff to these studies, I hope a brief historical...

Download PDF "Susan Browning: A Reflection on One Order from both Sides of the Stream" It is 1989 and I am sitting in the parlour of St. Andrew’s United Church in Chatham, Ontario.  The room is filled with all the familiar accents.  Hymn books and Bibles sit on a...

Download PDF Janice Frame "One Ministry? Really?" My first career was as a Medical Laboratory Technologist in a city hospital. A small portion of my time was spent in blood collection as a phlebotomist, while most of my work was in the lab, running tests on patient...

Download PDF "Reflecting on One Order of Ministry" by Mardi Tindal The “One Order” proposal provides us with an extraordinary opportunity to consider what leadership is needed within - and from - a postmodern church. My hope is that our conversations will break us...

As we draw this series of blogs on One Order of Ministry to a close, we're grateful to two past Moderators, Lois Wilson and Peter Short, for their wisdom and insight as they offer the final reflections. Ministry is a demanding, Spirit-led, and complex vocation, and my...

Download PDF "Peter Short: Reflections on Ministry" The work of a minister is a bewildering array. Are you not a counselor? Are you not a mediator? Community development leader, educator, advocate? And aren't you a public speaker, an administrator and a servant? You...

 Download PDF "Lois Wilson: Which Way will the United Church Go?"             I welcome the current discussion around One Order of Ministry because we need clarity in this area of our church’s life. Ephesians 4: 11 puts it succinctly, “The gifts we have were that some...