General News and Announcements

July 7, 2010

The 2010 McGeachy Senior Scholarship, to develop leaders who will provide The United Church of Canada with discernment and direction to inspire the church toward creative and faithful mission, has been awarded to co-recipients Dr. Caryn Douglas and Dr. Carolyn Whitney-Brown.

Caryn Douglas

Dr. Caryn Douglas received a B.A. at Victoria College (University of Toronto), a diploma in Diaconal Ministry at the Centre for Christian Studies, a Master of Religious Education from St. Michael’s College (University of Toronto), and a Doctor of Ministry from St. Stephen’s College (Edmonton). Currently, Caryn is completing a contract as the Designated Lay Ministry Co-ordinator at Five Oaks/Calling Lakes Centres, where she designed and implemented a distance model diploma program for lay ministry training.

Caryn is deeply rooted in the diaconal community and is familiar with its history. She has been a member of the United Church’s diaconal ministry since her commissioning in 1989. Caryn became a “story carrier” for the diaconal community during the decade of 1998-2008, when she was Principal of the Centre for Christian Studies, which offers a diploma program in diaconal ministry. She has taught courses on diaconal history and mentored diaconal formation, as well as participated in international diaconal conferences and meetings.

Caryn brings extensive church and community experience through her wider church work, publications, and presentations. Caryn is well-positioned to undertake a study on diaconal ministry.

McGeachy Scholarship Project

Caryn’s project is to research the lives of deaconesses, the women who rendered service in The United Church of Canada’s Deaconess Order (1926 to 1980). She plans to combine several research methodologies: interviews, archival research, and collecting and reviewing existing literature. Deaconesses in the United Church had a strong vocation to serve the world and the church. These women did “amazing and important work that helped to shape Canada’s commitment to providing universal social support systems, health care, and education.” Their contribution wove richness into the fabric of the United Church. While their numbers were relatively small, their influence was significant. In 1980, deaconesses became part of the Order of Ministry and in 1982, they became known as diaconal ministers.

In the spirit of the United Church’s 2006 apology to the deaconesses who were “disjoined” from ministry when they married, Caryn is committed to bringing the stories of these early pioneers to light. She wishes to explore the lives of these women, their backgrounds and motivation to give a life of service; and to discover our story as a church through them.

Key theological issues will emerge in themes regarding leadership (how the church was changed by these women’s ministries), vocation (how call is discerned), diaconal ministry (what is life giving about diaconal ministry), and community (partnerships in this ministry).

Contributions to The United Church of Canada and Beyond

From this research, Caryn’s goal is to create a print resource, as well as to post her project on the Diakonia of The United Church of Canada website. Another objective of Caryn’s is to facilitate a process of “community biography” as a tool to further strengthen the United Church identity as community, with a particular emphasis on the diaconal and ecumenical communities. Caryn wishes “to draw on the concept of research as a lived process of empowerment.”

Caryn writes: “The knowledge gained from this project will make women’s lives visible. It will also make visible the ecclesiological and theological world in which they lived. It will enable the United Church to see itself in new ways.”

Carolyn Whitney-Brown

Dr. Carolyn Whitney-Brown completed her B.A. at Victoria College (University of Toronto), and her M.A. and Ph.D. at Brown University (Rhode Island). Carolyn is a writer, artist, workshop-leader, and researcher. She teaches Distance Education for St. Jerome’s University (U. of Waterloo).

Carolyn is currently engaged in a project for L’Arche International to interview the founders of the first L’Arche community in the first 20 countries of the L’Arche International Federation. Carolyn lived at L’Arche Daybreak in Richmond Hill for seven years, and since then has completed a variety of projects for L’Arche Canada and L’Arche International. Her two commissioned door paintings can be seen at the Dayspring Chapel of L’Arche Daybreak in Richmond Hill, Ontario. She has coordinated national projects for the Canadian Council of Churches and the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, and for The United Church of Canada.

Her publications include the book Jean Vanier: Essential Writings, essays in collections such Northern Lights: An Anthology of Contemporary Christian Writing in Canada, and contributions to other books, newspapers, magazines, and various United Church publications.

McGeachy Scholarship Project

This project will explore the relationship between The United Church of Canada and Jean Vanier’s L’Arche communities. Beginning with the first L’Arche community in Canada in 1969, the United Church has had a long history with L'Arche, but that history is mainly unacknowledged, unrecognized, and almost completely unrecorded.

This project will explore the past, present, and future connections between The United Church of Canada and L’Arche in Canada. From the time that Jean Vanier spoke at the 25th General Council in 1972, the United Church and L’Arche in Canada have built enduring relationships. As a practical effort to live the gospel, and a concrete example of what The Manual calls “inclusive Christian fellowship,” the overall theological stance of Jean Vanier’s L’Arche and the United Church have been highly compatible.

Carolyn will examine this shared history and its legacy. There are 29 L’Arche communities spread across Canada. The United Church continues to be an intrinsic part of many of those communities. As new communities begin and leadership changes, how does the relationship between L’Arche and the United Church remain creative and faithful?

Contributions to The United Church of Canada and Beyond

This project will gather an important piece of living history before it is lost. The forward-looking implications of this project for the United Church include greater understanding of the inclusive and intercultural church to which we aspire. Four decades of lived experience with L’Arche could give the United Church further tools for intercultural engagement and a more complex understanding of culture. The project may also consider why so many people of the “Emerging Spirit generation” continue to be attracted to L’Arche. Finally, the project could develop the framework for a uniquely United Church contribution to the expanding field of theology and disability.

McGeachy Senior Scholarship

The McGeachy Senior Scholarship is made possible through a bequest from the estate of William A. and Margaret H. McGeachy of southwestern Ontario. The McGeachys’ commitment to the Christian church and the role of the church in society is memorialized in the scholarship, which is awarded as funds permit. The McGeachy Senior Scholar is expected to express the prophetic vision of the church and to interpret Christ’s call to justice and peace in our pluralistic world. The scholar will combine reflection and research with practical action, and communicate the results of this work in a form accessible to the wider church. The award is administered by the Communities in Ministry Unit of The United Church of Canada.