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Pillay reflected that United Church of Canada has a legacy of bold, prophetic public witness.
“Friends, we are living in difficult times,” said Pillay. “We are surrounded by conflicts, wars, trade wars, poverty, injustices, climate catastrophe, natural disasters, broken relationships, divorce, and death.”
It is too much to handle, he continued.
“Too much to fathom. Too much to bear,” he said. “What is needed is deep spirituality that enables us to never take our eyes off God.”
He noted that we can feel overwhelmed by the sheer scale and magnitude of global challenges. “The planet itself is now threatened with the disintegration of its ecosystems, the extinction of many species, and even the possible, eventual disappearance of humans, erasing this incredible and wondrous evolution of life, consciousness, and human knowledge and freedom from the earth,” he said. “We see these converging probabilities, the signs, the trends and likelihoods of impending crises, and we ask, where is our hope?”
How can we, he asked, defy probabilities, effect real change, and rescue our world from disaster?
“For us as Christians, true, realistic hope is anchored by faith, by a deep trust in God’s love and God’s promises, as revealed in the life and message, the death and resurrection, of Jesus,” he said. “We find in Jesus one so close to God, so beloved of God, so trusting of God, as to banish fear and engender hope and courage equal to any challenge.”
A virtue of the ecumenical movement has been its aim not only to renew but also to reform Christian church life, said Pillay. “We cannot do this on our own strength,” he said. “We need God`s power and presence.”
The history of the United Church of Canada offers clues to the shape of authentic and bold discipleship today and how we might address the many crises we face today.
“I believe your ecumenical solidarity has made and still makes the difference, even beyond the church itself, because our shared experience of God’s love sparks hope in us and is expressed in love for all humanity,” said Pillay. “So, let us be bold. Let’s be strong!”
Remaining silent, detached and complicit is not the way to go, Pillay urged. “We need to proclaim God`s justice and peace and love,” he said. “We need to speak truth to power and even to the church.”
Faith grounds our hope, Pillay said. “Christian hope is an unstoppable power by which faith does justice in the world,” he said. “In this way communities of faith, acting ecumenically, become bearers of hope and agents of reconciliation in and for the world.”
This way of life is also embodied in the ecumenical Pilgrimage of Justice, Reconciliation, and Unity, Pillay noted.
“We see the whole global ecumenical movement journeying toward justice, peace, and reconciliation,” he said. “Practically, that means pursuing human dignity, human rights, peace among peoples, and the health of the planet through deep engagement in concrete activities and consequential partnerships.”
During the service, church leaders retired the original Bible from 1925, and dedicated a new Bible, a Mohawk translation of the Bible completed by Harvey “Satewas” Gabriel and published in 2023.
The original Bible, which was used for 100 years, has been repaired and mended, and will now be placed in the archives.
The inscription in the new Bible reads: “Under the Wesleyan Methodist Board of Foreign Missions, a church was begun among the Mohawks on the Grand River in Ontario in 1822.”
