Another successful pancake supper!

A message from Gary Barfitt, President of the Guild of St. Joseph, affectionately known as the "Holy Joes":

"The Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper is now behind us, and on behalf of the Cathedral Guild of St. Joseph, I want to offer a huge thank-you to all those who helped make it a success. Thank you to all the volunteers (over 60 of you) who worked to get the pancakes, sausages, beans, and gingerbread prepared and moved from the back of the kitchen to the 208 diners at the tables in the Hall. We especially thank those diners who supported us by attending the event and enjoying the meal and the opportunity to spend time with friends. Your generosity raised over $2100 toward the work of the Guild."

Have a look at some photos below, courtesy of Carol Ann Melvin and Heather Perritt.

Belize Mission Trip – We want to hear from you!

Our Cathedral family has had an ongoing relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ who live in Belize, since our first mission trip in 2005 with the Cathedral Puppeteers. The Mission and Outreach Committee is now looking to gauge interest in potentially organizing another mission trip.

Listen to Brad McKnight from the Missions Committee speak to the Cathedral congregation on 16 February

God expects all Christians, and His church, to take the love of Christ into the world. One way in which we can do this is through mission. Part of this mission involves helping others, perhaps less fortunate than ourselves. From past experience we also know that both the preparation and the actual mission trip have a very positive effect on the spiritual growth and faith of individuals. For several it has been a life-changing and faith-growing experience.

Our most recent visit to Belize was in 2018, but we have kept an active relationship with St. Hilda's school and various scholarship students over the years. The school principal, Ms. Jane Martinez, has expressed a desire to have us return.

At this time, no dates have been determined, but if we were to consider a return in 2026, preparations will need to commence very soon. If there is enough interest, we will put together a steering committee and will organize sessions to share more information. Among other things, a team leader will be required and a commitment from others to participate on the home team as well.

For now, our ask is, for any of you who may be interested, to reach out to the Cathedral Office with your contact information.

Learn more about our support for St. Hilda's School, and our scholarship program for high school students in Belize.

Stewardship: a foundational document for the Anglican Church of Canada

Stewardship is a core Christian practice rooted in scripture. The Bible offers a commentary on human stewardship that begins with God’s purpose in setting our first ancestor in the garden “to till and keep it,” and ends in the new creation, in a recurring pattern of crisis and resolution. That pattern of human crisis and divine resolution flows through the Bible — in the creation, in the covenant with Abraham, in the law, the prophets and the writings of the Hebrew scripture, in the life of Jesus, and in the continuing life of his disciples after the resurrection.

The first crisis of human stewardship came with our first ancestors’ decision to test the sovereignty of God by consuming the only fruit in the garden reserved exclusively to the Creator. Rejecting stewardship and embracing the illusory promise of sovereign possession of the garden, they initiate a continuing pattern of exploitation, entitlement, violence and destruction that plagues human participation in the life of the earth. There is only one essential stewardship question:  Will we make use of resources entrusted to us to serve God’s mission, or for purposes that we ourselves devise or that are thrust upon us by an economy that depends absolutely on growing consumption to sustain it?

Stewardship is a response to the mission of God. When we invite persons into discipleship and baptize, we also invite them into the practices of faithful stewardship. Those practices are properly framed in terms of whether or not they contribute to what God desires in and for the life of the world.

The parable of the two sons opens up a stewardship crisis for leaders among the baptized. When we have turned inward to focus on our wants and needs, when we have used the language of stewardship to address our own religious agenda instead of God’s mission, when we have reduced the challenge of stewardship to servicing the existence, program and practices of the church, then we have squandered the treasure of God in a far country.

Will we make use of resources entrusted to us to serve God’s mission?

For Canadian Anglicans, no faithful conversation about stewardship can be undertaken without consideration of the Baptismal Covenant and the Marks of Mission of the Anglican Communion. The former is, like the “Rule of Life” that preceded it in the Catechism of the Book of Common Prayer, (p. 544) a framework for faithful personal participation in the mission of God. And the Marks of Mission form a framework for faithful corporate participation in that mission. The Resources for Mission Department works in partnership with dioceses to foster a generous sense of stewardship across the Canadian Church.

The Baptismal Covenant offers an expansive vision of stewardship, including commitments to the community and its common life; to resisting evil and turning away from our participation in it; to offering the world the gospel of Jesus Christ as an alternative to its story of entitlement, consumption, and conflict, to embody that gospel in acts of service and to work for justice, peace and the dignity of persons.

The Marks of Mission complement and support the principles and practices of the Baptismal Covenant with a commitment to shape our common life in alignment with the mission of God., Beginning with “the Good News of the Kingdom” they offer a set of shared practices that include inviting people to inhabit that Kingdom through baptism, and to enact the Kingdom’s ethos in response to human need, in a commitment to justice, in care for creation and in reconciliation and peace-making.

God sets out in mission to make all things new. It is God’s mission to transform persons, to redeem us and restore us to joyful and useful participation in God’s work. It is God’s mission to transform the church as well, to redeem and restore our common life so that we might live as stewards of God’s abundant gifts, and invite others into that stewardship – for the sake of the world God loves.

This document was approved as a theological rationale for the work of the Resources for Mission Department of General Synod by the Standing Committee on Philanthropy.

Stewardship: A faithful response to God's mission