Reflections on the heritage, life & work of faith communities in Ottawa and Eastern Ontario
On Sunday, October 5th — as a rich, amber sun was beginning to set on an unseasonably warm fall afternoon — I had the chance to attend an Evensong service at St. Matthew’s Anglican Church at 217 First Avenue, in the Glebe. St. Matthew’s takes a high church approach to liturgy, which made Evensong —…
Completed in 1955 in the Neo-Gothic style, Rideau Park United Church remains a vibrant congregation with a particularly robust music ministry — something that became clear to me when I visited on the last Sunday of the summer season, September 21, at the 10:00 am service. Close to 100 people were in attendance that Sunday….
Built in 1887, St. Margaret’s Anglican Church was once a village chapel serving the rural community of Janesville. In its early years, it was a mission church of the much more affluent St. Bartholomew’s Church in nearby New Edinburgh. This “chapel of ease” located along the road that connected Ottawa to Montreal served poorer English…
When one visits a church and hears that the congregation’s clergywoman is sometimes known as “the little Pope from Brockville,” the risk of tuning out the sermon is greatly diminished. I had the chance to visit Wall Street United Church in Brockville on a couple of occasions this summer and in each instance, I found…
On my way to the Glengarry Pioneer Museum’s Fall Harvest Fair on a crisp morning, I stopped by St. Michael and All Angels Anglican Church in Maxville, Ontario, and attended their 9:00 am Sunday service. Built in 1860 as a Presbyterian church and later to serve as the spiritual home of a Baptist community, the…