EFM: Education For Ministry welcomes new members for September 2020

As Christians we live Christ’s word in the world and that is our ministry. In Education for Ministry or EfM, we develop listening skills, we wrestle with scripture that doesn’t make any sense to us today, and texts that benefit from being situated in their historical contexts. We learn that scripture that speaks to us in different ways depending on what we are currently experiencing. We read interlude books together by contemporary authors from Julia Gatta’s Life in Christ, Practicing Christian Spirituality to Deitrich Bonhoeffer’s Life Together, The Classic Exploration of Christian Community, to pick just two. We take real world events and experiences and look at them through the eyes of tradition and culture and personal beliefs, comparing and contrasting God’s view versus the Worlds’ view. Most of the people we meet aren’t practicing Christians, yet they are God’s people and we serve them in any way we can.

Because of COVID-19, our courses will likely start online in September, so it is recommended that any new students have a computer that would allow them to use Zoom or an equivalent tool. We’ll meet in person once we are allowed to, so for those in the Montreal area there is a course on the McGill Campus at Montreal Diocesan Theological College, for the Lower Laurentians there is a course in Lachute, and for the Eastern Townships, there is a course at Grace Church in Sutton. Participants enroll one year at a time for this four-year program. It starts with the Hebrew Bible, then the New Testament, followed by church history, liturgy and theology, and ending with contemporary works. Tuition is $350 per year (a lower rate than normal since we are a sponsoring Diocese of the program).

Please contact Nancy Greene-Gregoire (514-862-5367 or ngreene@acm.org) for Lachute or Montreal, and Tim Smart (revtimsmart@gmail.com) for Sutton. We’d like to have all new registrations in by July 15, but later registrations can often be accommodated.