Caledonia Times
October, 2014 Volume 46, Issue 10 The Diocesan Section of the Anglican Journal
Tearing down the organ has led to new, fuller life for Church instrument By Elaine Anselmi, Alaska Highway News
Tools, parts and pipes of every size fill the nave and sanctuary at St. Mark’s Anglican Church Sunday services have been temporarily relocated to the church’s hall as lots of space is needed for a major project: refurbishing music director Merrill Flewelling’s 1919 Casavant pipe organ.
“It’s a very complicated instrument with a very simple result: beautiful music that is created by actual wind sound - it’s not electronically generated - which has a full range of frequency and full range of sound,” said St. Mark’s pastor Tim Johnson. “I think what it enables is the support of a liturgical form of worship that has been valuable in the church for centuries.” The project requires a very specific skill set. Thankfully, a friend of the congregation, an electrical engineer and organist who lives out of town, was brought in to tend to the very large project, which he said gets bigger and bigger at every step. (The craftsman has asked to remain anonymous, and will be referred to as Dan Michaels.) Michaels said working on the instrument requires both familiarity with the piece and curiosity of the unknown. Once the project is completed (this coming Ash Wednesday is the hopeful deadline) the instrument will be extended from seven to 11 ranks - organ talk for a complete set of pipes - through the addition of a Positif organ that Flewelling acquired while heading up the music program at Northern Lights College. “He purchased, for the music department, a kit set organ of four ranks from the United States in 1980 as part of the Northern Lights College music program,” said Michaels. “That arrived, they set it up in Fort St. John and tried to get it working, but it wasn’t very reliable.” Michaels said the Positif sat unused since then, mostly gathering dust. Now, not only are the two instruments being married, but upgraded with an electrical system for ease of use and tuning, without taking away from the natural wind sound. The main organ was built by Casavant Freres in St. Hyacinthe, Quebec. Michaels noted that at the time of its construction, a metals ban was in place because of World War I. “The pipes had to be made in France and imported as a completed part,” said Michaels, explaining how all scrap metal was supposed to be reserved for the war effort, but an exception was made for unbroken, complete pieces. The Casavant was originally installed at an Angli-
Above: Archdeacon Tom Johnson stands with the various wood and metal pipes laid out and ready for the reassembling of the 1919 Casavant Brothers Organ at St. Mark’s, Dawson Creek. can cathedral in Edmonton, where it was converted from tubular-pneumatic action - the organ’s console is connected through lead tubes to the valves that control wind through the pipes - to electro-pneumatic action, in which electric current, controlled by the keys of the organ console, operates the valves.
lenge of maintaining the instruments, with the climate offering an extra roadblock in terms of keeping them in tune and functioning properly.
“Sometime during the 1960s, two things happened: one was that the original pneumatic action was converted to electro-pneumatic and it moved to the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Dawson Creek,” said Michaels, adding that during this time a leak in the roof of the church caused damage to the instrument - the extent of which they discovered during this process of refurbishing.
Johnson added that with much of the development in the region coming after the 1950s, the option of bringing in modern electric organs was already in place.
“Their style of liturgy and music changed and they no longer had a need for it, so they wanted to dispose of it. That’s when Merrill bought it.”
A part of the current project at St. Mark’s is also moving the massive instrument, which required disassembling the entire organ, consisting of more than 400 parts. Michaels pointed out that one part of the organ, the wind chest, required six people to lift. “Having disassembled it, we were able to see that there was damage inside it that had to be repaired. So part of this process is to recondition and repair the damage that was done and the aging process that has damaged parts of it,” said Michaels.
Flewelling purchased the instrument, installing it in the Truss Factory in Dawson Creek. Then, under new ownership, it again had to be moved, this time to a storage unit. “When Merrill took up the music director position here [at St. Mark’s], the organ was installed in the church here,” said Michaels. The Casavant organ has been in place at St. Mark’s since 2010, although Johnson said they haven’t yet been able to play it to its full potential. Pipe organs are a rare sight in churches in the North. Michaels attributes part of that to the chal-
“I haven’t heard of any pipe organs north of Prince George in this province,” said Michaels.
“By the 50s or 60s, if you were looking at a new church and a new organ, electrics are possible, ... whereas 50 years before that, you either had a pipe organ or you didn’t have an organ,” said Johnson.
Various problems came up that temporarily stopped or delayed the renovation process, he said - there was no point in continuing on without addressing them. “There’s only one way you can do organ building, and that’s doing it right the first time, or you have all of these other problems down the road,” said Michaels. Michaels has been at work on the project since See Tuning Up on p. 4
Informing and Inspiring the Faithful in Northern BC sine 1905
I am not a cat lover. But one of our daughters is, and her stories often remind me of “The In and Out Song” performed by Garrison Keillor. It’s a humorous piece about a cat that wants to go out, until it is out, at which point it wants to come in! Cats, I realized, are not that different from people in this respect. We want what we want – until we get it; and then we want something else which may well be the very opposite of what we just got. We want free will from God to do as we choose, but at the same time we expect God to protect us from all that we don’t want, including the consequences of many of our decisions. In our parishes we want what we want (usually our buildings and an absolutely brilliant priest who is available 24/7) but we don’t want the obligations that go with those expectations. This is not something new. It is a story repeated over and again through history and can be found throughout the Bible. Like the cat in “The In and Out Song”, we are sometimes so focused on our changing expectations that we are blind to how crazy what we do appear to others watching us. Our Lord did teach us something about this – in the words of The Lord’s Prayer, Jesus taught us to pray, “…Your will be done…”, which calls us to align our actions and expectations with God’s, rather than our own. As St. Augustine wrote, “Your will should be corrected to become identified with God’s will. You must not bend God’s will to suit yours.” The reality is that this can
Bishop’s Notes Going out and coming in just like the old cat, who cannot make up its mind be difficult, not least because when we want something we can easily convince ourselves that because we want it, it must be good, and because it is good (in our minds), it must be from God. But when God wants something, we usually have no difficulty making excuses for why it’s unrealistic. One way of countering this tendency to selfdeception is to ask how a particular course of action further accomplishes God’s will in the world. St. Jerome taught; The eyes of all are turned upon you. Your house is set on a watchtower; your life fixes for others the limits of their self-control. If our neighbours see us, as confessing Christians, conforming to the world in contradiction to the teachings of Christ and Holy Scripture, they will see no reason to come to God. But if they see in us something more than the world can provide, if they see in our everyday lives the Gospel being translated from words into deeds, then they may come seeking God. Too often we are told that if we simply become more like the world around us we will become more attractive to people. And so people are tempted to jettison practices and beliefs that the world does not understand in favour of what the world does understand. Scripture becomes irrelevant because the world is unfamiliar with it. Christ’s teaching is watered down or abandoned because it makes no
sense to someone who has not encountered the risen Christ. The deep, sacrificial love of Christ is replaced by a shallow, self-serving facsimile of love. What we need to remember is that from the moment of His birth in a Bethlehem stable, to His death on the cross, Jesus’ life was a model of not living according to the world’s standards, but instead of living a life of submission to God’s will. In doing this He changed the world, one person at a time. As Christians, this is the challenge we are called to face in how we live our lives.
+William Caledonia
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Council of the North Sunday Celebrate a Council of the North Sunday in your parish and help raise awareness about the Church’s mission and ministry in the north. Visit www.anglican.ca/cn to download or order our video and a variety of other resources to make your celebration a truly inspired worship event. You can also contact Council of the North Communications at cnc@national.anglican.ca.
Caledonia Times A Publication of the Diocese of Caledonia Publisher: The Rt. Rev. William Anderson Editor: The Very Rev. Jason Haggstrom Ass’t Editor: Audrey Wagner Published monthly, except July and August by: Diocese of Caledonia, 200 – 4th Avenue West Prince Rupert, BC V8J 1P3 (250) 627-1143 or (250) 600-7143 Address correspondence and copy to the address above or to caledoniatimes@gmail.com Submissions must be received by the 1st of the month for the following month’s issue. Send subscription orders, address changes Diocese of Caledonia c/o Anglican Journal 80 Hayden St. Toronto, Ontario M4Y 3G2 Printed and mailed by: Webnews Inc., North York ON.
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Caledonia Times — October 2014
In recent weeks, I have become more aware of how much I have and am enjoying fatherhood. The thought struck me as I got in the passenger side of our Dodge Journey and passed the keys to my 18 year old son who is learning to drive. I called out to him as I was coming home from the Cathedral offices and told him, “Put your “L” on... you can drive.” A great smile came over his face and he disappeared quickly to the interior of the van to grab the magnetic letter that identifies him as a new driver. My son has done several hours of driver’s training with a proper instructor first and now he has to learn how to deal with his mom or dad in the passenger seat, helping, guiding, correcting as he learns to handle the van through the city streets. It is a different experience driving the family van as opposed to driving the school’s car. They respond differently, handle differently. One thing is sure: he is growing in confidence. As confidence grows, there are more aggressive manoeuvres. In fact, I had to remind my son just this morning that speed, even in a parking lot, can kill. So as a pastor, a priest and a Father within the life of the temporal Church, there is something that I want to raise with you and remind you of as we will soon start to prepare for another Diocesan Synod in 2015. There is lots of talk about what people think will happen at General Synod in 2016, concerning the possibility and the
Editorial Moments
Driving with the teenage Church probability that there are going to be changes to Canon 21 (XXI) of the National Church. These changes would allow for two persons legally qualified in civil society to marry, to be married in the Anglican Church of Canada. Let me remind you of what we said as a Synod when we last met in the Fall of 2012: by an overwhelming majority both orders of the House, our Synod choose to reaffirm the principles contained in the Solemn Declaration made by one of our earliest Diocesan Synods (circa 1880’s); 1. We [the clergy and people of Caledonia] receive the doctrine, sacraments and discipline of Christ as the same is contained and commanded in Holy Scripture…and set forth the same in its standards of Faith and Doctrine. 2. We acknowledge ourselves bound by all acts that may be passed by the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada … so far as such acts shall not interfere with this Diocese as part of the church Catholic. I remind us all of this motion for an important reason. We need in our congregations to be aware of what is going on and what is coming because it is going very much affect us, both in
I am Malala: the girl who lived The terrorist attacks of 911, the Taliban violence in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and now the Isis atrocities leave us in the West focusing on Islam as a barbaric culture. While there is no denying the violence, I wanted a broader view. With that in mind I read the book I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban. I Am Malala is the autobiography of Malala Yousafzai written with the help of Christina Lamb. It is also, however, a political history of the beginning of the 21century in Malala’s area of northern Pakistan called Swat. This girl’s life coincides with the rise of the Taliban in her homeland. Malala was born in 1997 which was just one year after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan. Her family belong to the Pashtun tribe - people who inhabit northern Afghanistan and Pakistan. (The Taliban are also Pashtuns) Malala’s story becomes the story of the Taliban as it moves from Afghanistan across the border into Swat. The tactics of these radical Muslims are compared by the authors to Hitler’s approach in Germany - intensive propaganda, brutal bullying and a gradual tightening of the noose on people who choose not to conform. Caledonia Times — Ocotber 2014
As I have read what has been posted by the Commission that is going to write the motion for the next General Synod, the reading makes me feel at times that I am a parent trying to give direction to a teenage Church who is speeding through a swiftly filling parking lot, not heeding others that can be injured and even killed. So the question is, “Will the Primate’s Commission listen to the voices that are clearly saying no... how will they and we respond?”
Jason+ The Very Rev. Jason Haggstrom, Editor, Caledonia Times
fere with Malala’s voice.
Books on the Way By Ruby McBeth
the short term and in the long term. We need to be discussing how do we can be responding pastorally to those who are in need and how we are going to be Church when the funds of the National Church dry up. The current financial situation grows worse not better. This means there are going to be losses in terms of the monies we receive from the National Block Grant to support the ministries of our diocese and there could and will be costs in terms of human skills, talents, and experience that are precious to the ways in which we make ministries happen. Are we ready for that? It is something we need to talk about and prepare for.
Girls in Pakistan are supposed to be kept out of the public eye; so how did Malala get politically active? The answer lies with her father Ziauddin Yousafzai. Unlike other Pashtun men Ziauddin valued his daughterperhaps even more than his sons. He was a teacher and principal who founded many schools in Swat. He used the media in southern Pakistan to speak out against the Taliban. Malala tagged along and ended up doing a blog for the BBC- a diary of life under the Taliban. (She used an assumed name.) He also got her into interviews on national television. Because of her campaigning for education, she got awards at home and the beginnings of international fame. She also got on a Taliban death list for spreading secularism.
The 16 pages of photos in the book are mostly of Malala and her family; however, they do include pictures of a Taliban whipping someone, a bombed school, the blood in the bus where Malala was shot, and Malala in the hospital. Recommended generally. Yousafzai, Malala. I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2013.
Northern Pakistan and its culture are not well known to most westerners. The authors help us out by giving a map at the beginning of the book and a glossary at the end. Despite the political terror documented in the book, Malala’s youth helps to keep the tone light. She tells us, for example, about competing with her girlfriends for the highest grades and fighting with her brother. She includes details of her Islamic practices naturally as part of her everyday life. Christina Lamb who co-wrote the book has managed to not interPage 3
“tuning up” from Page 1 December. Although every piece of the organ is meticulously labeled and placed around the church, he said there is still quite a bit to do. “There are 160 adjustments of individual valves to be done, pipes to be regulated and tuned back again, just to get the main Casavant organ working - let alone the extension - so still a lot of work to do,” he said. Although the primary funding for the project has come from Flewelling, as the owner of the instrument, there have been a number of donations of time,
tools and parts to make the project come together - not to mention the support of St. Mark’s Church. Jim Jarvis, a mechanical engineer from Fort St. John, has contributed a great deal of time to the project, Brad Manson and Gordon Moffat supplied vehicles, Don Sterling of EPSCAN sourced cables and control components for the organ, and Rip’s Shoe Renu put in leather working items and tools. Michaels was also flown into town with Air Miles points donated by Anne Clayton. Johnson said it was a sort of “happy accident” that the Casavant made its way to Dawson Creek - adding that it was an extra bonus that the problematic Positif organ will have life again after never functioning properly. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” said Johnson. “There’s a way in which it’s a community project, and a church project.”
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Comic Corner
Church Life: Across Canada Briefs Praying for missing women About 80 people in North Bay, Ont., gathered onJune 12 to walk, pray for and honour schoolgirls abducted in Nigeria as well as missing women in Canada. Participants wore white armbands with the names of missing women written on them. (The White Ribbon Campaign, which began in Canada, is now an international movement of men who oppose violence against women and vow that they “will not commit, condone or remain silent about violence against women and girls.”) Following white flags, the group moved from a Roman Catholic church to a United church and finished at an Anglican church. At each church, there was a short liturgy, including music, prayers and stories. While at the United church, people read aloud the names of missing aboriginal women as the Northern Kwe Drum group offered the “Strong Woman Song.” Algoma Anglican Protestors call for refugee health care At its most recent consultation in Halifax, the Canadian Council for Refugees (CCR) expressed its continued concern for refugees who were cut off from essential health care services in 2012. Refugee claimants from designated countries now receive no health care unless it is a public health or safety concern. “Rather than providing preventative care for our future citizens…this policy makes people wait to seek medical care until a situation becomes an emergency,” writes Carolyn Vanderlip, refugee sponsorship coordinator for the diocese of Niagara. The diocese is a member of the CCR, a national non-profit organization committed to the rights and protection of refugees. Rallies were held in Hamilton and many cities across Canada on June 16,which was declared a National Day of Action by the Canadian Doctors for Refugee Care to show “the federal government that Canadians will stand up for the most vulnerable among us.” Niagara Anglican Funding for indigenous ministry education The Nova Scotia Anglican Church Women (NS ACW) has announced that its 2014/2015 annual project will raise funds for bursaries for indigenous students attending an indigenous school of ministry. “Northward Bound—Bursaries for Ministry” will fund one-year studies that will train and equip students for mission. The board not-
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ed that of approximately 295 Council of the North clergy, 134 are non-stipendiary. Many spend countless hours performing ministry in addition to working at another job to support their families. A bursary may be the only way that they could afford to attend a school of ministry. The Diocesan Times Rupert’s Land expands On Aug. 1, the diocese of Rupert’s Land officially grew to include 12 parishes located west of Winnipeg, which were formerly part of the diocese of Keewatin. At its synod in October, the diocese will welcome Church of the Good Shepherd, Atikokan; St. Luke’s Dryden; Holy Trinity, Minnitaki; St. John’s, Fort Frances; Emmanuel Church, Ignace; St. Alban’s Cathedral, Kenora; Pinawa Christian Fellowship; St. John’s, Lac du Bonnet; St. John’s, Rainy River; Shared Ministry in Red Lake; St. Mary’s, Sioux Lookout; and St. John’s, Wabigoon. The northern part of the diocese of Keewatin was renamed as the Indigenous Spiritual Ministry of Mishamikoweesh. Rupert’s Land News Planting a symbol of reconciliation Celebrating its centenary year, the diocese of Edmonton gave each parish a chokecherry tree to be planted near its church. The chokecherry is a sacred plant in many aboriginal culture and the trees are intended to be a living symbol of a continued commitment to seek understanding and reconciliation with aboriginal peoples. The Messenger University students try church crawl Last year a group of 20 churches in Ottawa and many campus clubs from the University of Ottawa launched a pilot project to introduce students to Christian communities in their neighbourhood. The twist on the more typical pub crawl was a success and is back by popular demand this September. More than 100 students signed up to participate in a scavenger hunt around the campus and neighbourhood, where they will encounter more than 20 different church communities. “I believe the event’s success can be attributed, in part, to its ecumenical nature. We’re not telling students where to go or what to think. We’re just letting them know we are here for them,” writes Zack Ingles in a youth column in the diocesan newspaper. Crosstalk
Caledonia Times — October 2014