Imagining, Living, and Telling the Faith Story.
A Scientist Reimagines the Nature of Church
A new church plant is a rarity in these days of declining membership in mainline congregations.
Even more so, perhaps, when the church plant involves an existing 145-year-old building, and a focus on ministry to college and university students, young adults living in the neighbourhood, and those experiencing homelessness and dealing with poverty.
In ReInvention: Stories from an Urban Church, Mark Whittall shares the insights and wisdom he and a small but dedicated team gained as they worked to establish a new congregation in St. Alban's Church, the second oldest Anglican parish in Ottawa.
The challenges the team faced were not small: the renovation of the original building, negative reaction from the community to the placement of a day program for the homeless, creating new liturgies and a new kind of church experience, and learning how best to reach out to and involve people with little or no prior church involvement. The result of all these efforts, however, has been the transformation of St. Alban's into a vibrant centre for worship, a beautiful venue for the arts, and place of shelter and safety for many of the city's most vulnerable inhabitants.
Published by Wood Lake Publishing Inc., January 4, 2016
ISBN 978-1-77064-805-0 | 6" x 9" Paperback, 160 pages, $19.95
Only $13.97 per copy - a 30% discount.
Order your copies now! Click Here to Order
Use promo code rein1 at checkout to receive additional discount.
Offer valid until January 4, 2016. Book will ship in January 2016.
What Advance Readers have to Say
A lively and absorbing account of one pastor's experience in what is surely going to be the reality for many of today's clergy: church planting and revitalization. Mark Whittall writes with honesty, energy and faithfulness. This is a book that will encourage and empower others along the way.
- Anna Carter Florence, Ph.D. Peter Marshall Associate Professor of Preaching, Columbia Theological Seminary
Mark Whittall is a leader, an entrepreneur, and a scientist with a pastor's heart. He leads us on a journey where the future creates the present - the eschatological hope and vision that shatters the doubt and negativity of the past. Mark does not know the meaning of "it's not possible."
- Rev. Gregor Sneddon, Rector at St. Luke's Ottawa
How refreshing to read a story that runs against the familiar tropes of inevitable church decay and decline! Mark Whittall's account of planting a new church in a tough context is the story of creative pastoral sagacity - an ability to reimagine church and to bring a vision to birth. It is the story of a distinctively Anglican church plant - rooted in place, nourished by the great traditions of liturgy and sacrament, unafraid of the best insights of the human sciences, and committed to justice for all - yet also one that relates those orientations to the realities of the congregation's contemporary urban milieu. We can be grateful that the insights that have arisen from this adventure are made available to a wider public in an engaging, accessible prose.
- Kevin Flynn, Director, Anglican Studies Program, Saint Paul University, Ottawa
The Church that we live and pray in today will not look or feel the same in ten years. That is to say, if we pray with unceasing clarity, listen intently to the murmurings of a lively and chaotic Spirit of God, attune ourselves to the public square, and be mindful of the needs of religious people and those seeking God in these times, our church communities will be more vibrant and more faithful, but very different. And if we do not do these things, the church will become a historic relic that merely reminds us of what we used to do in early days, and leave us wondering why it is not working today.
In his book ReInvention: Stories from an Urban Church, Rev. Mark Whittall, calls us to all of this and more in an engaging and attractive manner. Mark, a priest in the Diocese of Ottawa of which I am currently the bishop, assumed leadership and responsibility of an empty building, St. Alban's, located in Ottawa's downtown core. He was charged with the task of building (planting) a vibrant mission-focused community of holy people that long to be faithful to the mission of God in today's multi-cultural, multi-religious, and diverse society. In carrying out this charge, he challenged the faithful, challenged the church institution, and challenged the growing number of seekers and members of this "new creation" to be bold and to take risks, but to be always mindful of God's call to love God and love our neighbour, and to be faithful stewards of the gifts God has given to all of us.
Mark's good nature, wit, and wisdom draw us forward, page after page, to journey with him and the community of St. Alban's. And we must journey with them, because the challenges that he and the people of St. Alban's face are the same challenges faithful Christians across the land face in their parishes, and in those parishes we imagine might exist someday. This is a hopeful story, a Godly story, and a human story. It is a worthwhile read for all who seek God in community and for those who struggle to know God more fully.
- The Rt. Rev. Dr. John H. Chapman, 9th Bishop of the Diocese of Ottawa
About the Author, Mark Whittall
The Rev. Mark Whittall is the pastor of St. Alban's Church and a priest of the Anglican Diocese of Ottawa. He is an engineer by training, and obtained graduate degrees in Theoretical Physics and in Development Economics from Oxford University. His first career was as an engineer and executive in the high-tech sector, rising to the position of CEO and earning recognition as Ottawa's Entrepreneur of the Year in 2000. Soon afterwards, he left his business career and turned to the study of theology. He served as professor, History of Science, at Augustine College in Ottawa from 2002 to 2007, and was ordained as an Anglican priest in 2008. After a brief stay in a rural parish, he was tasked with building a new congregation at St. Alban's Church in downtown Ottawa in 2011, where he currently serves as pastor.
Want More?
A Sampler of the book is available as a downloadable PDF, which can be printed. To download, click HERE.
A web flipbook version of the Sampler is below:
Only $13.97 per copy - a 30% discount.
Order your copies now! Click Here to Order
Use promo code rein1 at checkout to receive additional discount.
Offer valid until January 4, 2016. Book will ship in January 2016.
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