Press Releases

Monday, November 24, 2008

Toronto: The United Church of Canada’s Moderator David Giuliano is entering what he describes as the “home stretch” of his three-year term of office. It has been a period that early on was marked by the unexpected challenge of facing a personal journey “through a valley of shadows carved out by cancer.”

This journey is celebrated in a new book entitled Postcards from the Valley: Encounters with Fear, Faith, and God, published by United Church Publishing House.

The book features a collection of David Giuliano’s previously published articles and more recent writing, including his regular blog postings on WonderCafe.ca*, the United Church’s public online discussion forum. It is both a personal reflection on his journey toward the heart of God and the journey being made by many mainline churches.

“I dreamed of leading our church for a time from a place of strength, wisdom, and creativity. Instead I have been offering my weakness to the church,” says Giuliano. And although he admits this journey is not one that he would have chosen, “I cannot deny that it has been a gift to me and to others.”

Giuliano’s book invites readers to reflect on fear, faith, joy, and the encounter with the Holy One in their own lives and within the common life of the church.

“Personally, this journey through the valley has been a source of deepening my experience of the presence of God and of the Way of Jesus,” writes Giuliano in the foreword to his book. He describes the journey as a breaking open of the heart that has been an unwelcome and unasked-for blessing.

For the church, he says, his “wound near the temple” has become a lens through which he has tried to speak to the woundedness of our temple.

“As a community we are learning about the ‘valley of shadows’ after a history spent primarily on top of the world. We are experiencing tremendous change and loss as a community. The church we have known and loved is dying,” writes Giuliano. “Death is always part of transformation. We don’t know where it will lead, but we do know that we no longer claim special authority and place in our culture. For a long time we rode a great white charger. Now we are learning to ride the donkey. There is confusion, denial, and pain, as well as hope, in our body. I think we are closer to Jesus.”

Postcards from the Valley: Encounters with Fear, Faith, and God is published by United Church Publishing House. The book can be ordered online at Chapters Indigo* or by contacting United Church Resource Distribution at 1-800-288-7365 or 416-253-5456 or e-mail UCRD.

David Giuliano will be available for media interviews November 26, November 27, and December 2, 2008.

To arrange media interviews with the author, contact:

• Mary-Frances Denis
  Communications Officer
  The United Church of Canada
  Tel: 416-231-7680 ext. 2016
  Toll-free: 1-800-268-3781 ext. 2016
  E-mail: Mary-Frances Denis