Celebrating 100 years at Navan-Vars United Church

On September 13, over 140 people filled the pews of Navan-Vars United Church to capacity, in what was a standing-room only Sunday service to mark the 100th anniversary of this little red brick church. Located on the eastern-most boundary of Ottawa, the church at 1129 Smith Road is a place where rural life meets the city. And that’s not just a geographic reality but it also reflects the experiences of the members of this congregation. During the celebration, several spoke about their family’s longstanding connection to farming and to the lands of Eastern Ontario. While most of the faithful present at the service live locally, are active in the congregation or have close family who attend the church, some traveled long distances to mark a century of history and their ancestral connection to this faith community.

Navan United Church, as it was originally known, opened its doors on September 10, 1926 and was built at a cost of $8,000. The United Church of Canada had just been established three months earlier in June 1925, with the merger of most Methodist and Presbyterian communities. The Ottawa Citizen reported on the laying of the new church’s cornerstone in its June 25, 1926 issue. “The village of Navan was thronged with people,” wrote the Citizen of the well-attended ceremony. The Reverend J.H. Edmison of the national United Church affixed the cornerstone, noting that the new generation owed much to the “early settlers who had set the school and the church as the centre of their ideals when they first made their homes in the new country.” Reverend G. Watt Smith served as the newly built church’s first minister. The architecture of the new church incorporates some modest Neo-Gothic elements and features a red brick veneer. It was designed by R.A. Kemp Limited. At the time, the church was reported to have a maximum seating capacity of 170, including both the nave and the chancel, in what would undoubtedly be a tight configuration.

Even before the construction of this new church, both Presbyterian and Methodist communities were present in Navan. Between 1860 and 1913, the two denominations shared a church building east of Navan, on the site of what is now the Wilson Memorial Cemetery. A simple country church had been erected on that site by Mrs. Jessie Wilson, a descendant of a prominent pioneer family. She used a bequest received from her father to erect a church for both Presbyterians and Methodists. By 1918, years before the formal church union, the Presbyterians and Methodists gathered in the local Orange Hall and celebrated joint services with a shared minister. When the United Church in nearby Vars closed its doors in 1971, the church at 1129 Smith Road was renamed Navan-Vars United Church.

On September 13, the service began with words of welcome from Don McCartney, the Chair of the Church Council. This brief address was followed by birthday greetings extended to a longstanding member of the congregation, Wally Smith. The faithful joined in singing “Happy Birthday.” Four congregants — Barrie Johnston, Ruth Powell, James Cotton, and Heather Monkman — shared memories stretching back many decades. We learned, for instance, of the church’s historic pump organ. While it’s no longer in the church, it was salvaged by the Monkman family and is now preserved in their home.

Laurie Watson directed the choir at the service, offering a rich variety of music. This included a choir of nine choristers and a pianist, as well as families from the parish offering additional music. Many of the hymns, including the Doxology, “The Church’s One Foundation” and “Great is Thy Faithfulness” were from the Voices United hymnal. The Moffatt family also gathered to offer four songs, several with a pleasantly nostalgic air. These included “Church in the Wildwood,” “Just a Closer Walk With Thee,” “It Is No Secret,” and “Lord of the Dance.” The “Church in the Wildwood” evokes a pastoral scene of a country church, the landscape around it, and childhood memories. The version shared at Navan-Vars United was popularized by Dolly Parton.

Reverend Nancy Best offered the sermon at the Sunday service. She had a warm, conversational tone. Earlier this year, some 60 members of the broader community visited the little church as part of Doors Open Ottawa. Many of the visitors were entirely “unchurched,” never having set foot inside a church before. They asked about the difference between various denominations. Rev. Best shared then, and during the anniversary celebration, how welcomed and valued she felt within this local congregation and in the broader United Church as a female member of the clergy, and as a Christian who embraces her Mohawk heritage. Rev. Best shared:

As the granddaughter of a residential school survivor, one of the things I like most about our church is that we are a people of forgiveness, we are a people of looking ahead, and equality where everyone is valued and recognized. And I really feel that way about our children in particular. I’m so proud of our Sunday school and the fact that there has been a Sunday school since 1888. My goodness, that just blows me away…God is always calling us to set aside our human fallibility and to love each other, to make space for love. And when I look out and I think of all the stories, beautiful stories, the history, and the faith that has been passed down, I’m astounded. And it’s not stopping now, because yes, we have our Sunday school!

Navan-Vars United Church does, indeed, have something that is far from universal in mainline Protestant communities today. It has a multi-generational congregation and — even after all these decades — a vibrant Sunday school program for the youngest members. “Praise be to God whose power working in us can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine. Glory be to God in the Church and in Christ Jesus from generation to generation to generation,” Rev. Best said, closing her sermon with hope and enthusiasm.

After the service, a photographer captured the congregation and the many visitors in two group photos: one taken inside the packed church, and one in front of it. It’s clear that Navan-Vars United Church takes care to preserve the past, to capture the present and has reason to place hope in the future.

Christopher Adam