Born in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Babych began his career as a broadcast journalist. He started out at a radio station in Weyburn, Sask., and went on to work at radio and television stations in Calgary, Edmonton, Regina and Saskatoon.

Later in his career, he switched to print media, first writing for The Prairie Messenger, a Benedictine Catholic newspaper in Muenster, Sask. In 1992, he became the first Parliament Hill correspondent for the Canadian Catholic News, a news-sharing co-operative run by seven large Catholic newspapers in Canada. He was the first religion reporter to be accredited by the Canadian Parliamentary Press Gallery.

Before his retirement in 2015, he was the editor of Crosstalk for 10 years, working with Bishop Peter Coffin and Bishop John Chapman as publishers during those years. During that time, he won numerous awards as a writer, editor and photographer from the Canadian Church Press as well as the Associated Church Press in the U.S. He also helped the Anglican Journal cover several General Synods.

An excellent photographer, Babych continued to pursue photography as a freelancer, and his family wrote in a memorial that it was his passion.

The current Crosstalk editor is grateful for his kind advice and generousity sharing his excellent photos with the newspaper in recent years.

He is mourned by his wife Marilyn, son Darren, daughter Crystal (Greg Lilbourne), and stepson Michael Emond (Hanady Rahme & Gabe), as well as his grandson and many nieces and nephews.

A former journalist himself, Bishop Bruce Myers of the Anglican Diocese of Quebec shared this memory and prayer: “Before Art and I crossed paths in churchland as diocesan editors, we’d already worked alongside each other as parliamentary correspondents in Ottawa in the mid 90s, grinding out copy each day a few desks from each other in what was known as the Hot Room in the Centre Block on Parliament Hill. He was a great colleague and gifted journalist in both contexts. Rest eternal grant unto him, O Lord, and let light perpetual shine upon him.”

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There are two indications that this was a landmark building when construction resumed in the 1970s. First, there is the street sign indicating that this is the new location of a historic parish in the area. The second indication is the focal iron structure for the tower of the new church. Although new ideas about modern-looking buildings had been percolating since the late 1950s, the idea of a tower had a rather emphatic place in the larger history of Anglicanism.

To understand this, we must go back in time long before the idea of Anglicans worshipping at the summer resort of Britannia became popular, even back before the first churches were established in the Ottawa valley, to when the Church of England in England was contending with breakaway dissenting groups. Bound up as the Church of England was with the British state, it was the law of the land that no group of people meeting for worship, except for the established Church of England, could build a tower on their church. The idea was that one of the purposes of a church tower was to hold the bell (or bells) that rang on Sunday morning to remind local inhabitants to go to church. The same rule held true in Ireland with the Church of Ireland, in Scotland with the Church of Scotland, and in Wales with the Church of Wales.

When settlers from the British Isles arrived in the Ottawa valley in the early nineteenth century, they assumed that the Church of England (along with the Church of Scotland) was the established church in Canada. (The Quebec Act of 1774 guaranteed religious freedom to the Roman Catholic majority, effectively assuring them the right to have towers on their churches.) In fact, Anglicanism technically never was an established church of Canada, but in the grip of their assumptions, early clergy took pains to make sure that the churches they built featured towers. That idea obviously was still compelling for various reasons as late as the 1970s.

Early Anglican services were held at the summer resort of Britannia in a hall shared with various other denominations beginning in 1886. In 1890, Anglicans built a frame house of worship that came to be known as “the little church among the pines.” It was not consecrated until 1916, but among its claims to fame was that it provided the setting for shooting the silent film The Man from Glengarry in 1922.

When the original church was secularized on 9 February 1956, the bell was brought from its tower to this one. The need for having a bell tower in the new church was due to the bell itself having a history going back to the very roots of Britannia. It reputedly had been used on the estate of Judge William Cosgrove to summon workers from his vineyard at the end of the workday, only to end up calling parishioners at Saint Stephen’s to their weekly devotions.

The Diocesan Archives collects parish registers, vestry reports, service registers, minutes of groups and committees, financial documents, property records (including cemeteries and architectural plans), insurance policies, letters, pew bulletins, photographs and paintings, scrapbooks, parish newsletters and unusual items.

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From June 13th to 15th, I had the opportunity to attend the G7 Jubilee People’s Forum organized by the ecumenical social justice organization KAIROS and other groups. While the world waited to see what would be discussed and done at the G7 leaders’ meetings, more than 100 people from across Canada and around the world were gathering at Ambrose University in the east end of Calgary to take part in the People’s Forum. As the campus coordinator for the University of Ottawa Student Christian Movement chapter, I was grateful to be able to travel to attend with support from KAIROS and the World Student Christian Federation Canada’s Lois Freeman Wilson fund.

The Jubilee 2025 – Turn Debt into Hope campaign was a central focus of the forum. Building on the work of Jubilee 2000, which cancelled $100 billion of debt for 36 low-income countries, Jubilee 2025 is a global ecumenical initiative calling for:

• Debt cancellation for unjust and unsustainable debts.
• Global financial reform to prevent future crises.
• A debt resolution framework within the United Nations that is transparent, binding and fair.

The forum was intended to help turn the more than 38,000 signatures into a real political movement.

While there, participants had a chance to hear from Peruvian Cardinal Pedro Ricardo Barreto, a friend of Pope Francis and a human and environmental rights advocate. Cardinal Barreto spoke about the global importance of Jubilee and its religious significance. We also had the chance to participate in a multifaith prayer service hosted by the Calgary Interfaith Council. This included hearing about the Jewish roots of Jubilee from two rabbis, the Muslim tradition of debt forgiveness and poverty alleviation, and listening to music and prayer from Sikh, Buddhist, Christian, and Baha’i faith leaders. We ended the first evening with a Sikh langar, a traditional meal often served in a Gurdwara where everyone sits and eats communally, and everyone is served by volunteers. I had the immense privilege of being one of the volunteers given the chance to serve others.

Throughout the course of the forum, we heard from experts on the global debt crisis. Shockingly, more than three billion people in the world live in countries that spend more on trying to pay off debt than they do on education or healthcare. This crisis, as explained by Dean Dettloff, a research and advocacy officer at the Roman Catholic organization Development and Peace – Caritas Canada, is rooted in the history of colonialism and imperialism. Countries were underdeveloped, forced to take on massive debt to develop, and then forced by policies at institutions such as the World Bank to adopt harsh austerity packages to pay off the debt. Ultimately, this led to countries being trapped in a cycle of debt, austerity, and then debt again.

We closed the weekend by joining demonstrators from a variety of causes in a peaceful march through Calgary. Our distinctive flame signs with messages such as ‘hope not debt’ and ‘fund peace not war’ caught the attention of other attendees, the media, and bystanders. Standing with people from across Canada to send a unique, multifaceted message to the G7 leaders was very inspiring. From Filipino activists, Indigenous land defenders, Palestinian peace advocates, Jubilee campaign people protesting for debt justice, and many more causes, our march was a beautiful patchwork of a myriad of social causes.

As a campus co-ordinator for the Student Christian Movement, the forum was a unique opportunity for me as to connect with activists, faith leaders, and others from across the country. The opportunity to meet a dozen or so young people who, like me, had received support to attend reinvigorated my hope for the future of Christianity in Canada. The young people I met were deeply faithful people, but they were also leaders in their campuses, churches, and communities. They were activists, researchers, musicians, photographers, and so much more. If these are the kind of young people who our church makes an effort to nourish, inspire, and develop, our church has a bright future. KAIROS, particularly member relations and network co-ordinator Shannon Neufeldt, and the Jubilee Forum really worked to do that, and I hope it is an example that church organizations will follow.

If you would like to join the global Jubilee campaign with 38,000 Canadians, you can sign the petition here:

https://kairoscanada.org/jubilee-2025-canada/petition-turn-debt-into-hope

Related articles:

Youth internship alumnus starts ecumenical student group at the University of Ottawa

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Although he knew of some existing Christian groups on campus, “I didn’t see the kind of connection between faith and activism and social justice work that personally was something that actually drew me to becoming more of an active Christian when I was a teenager.” he told Perspective. Now 21 and preparing for his final year of a double-major political science and public administration degree, Adair participated in the Anglican Diocese of Ottawa’s Youth Internship Program (YIP) for two years as a teen.

The Student Christian Movement is an ecumenical, social justice-oriented, youth-led international movement. Adair said he knew of SCM, but his interest in it was re-invigorated when he read a biography of the late Canadian politician Tommy Douglas, who had been involved with the SCM in his youth. Realizing that SCM was still an active organization and wanting to create something on campus to leave for others after he graduates next year, Adair decided to create a chapter of SCM. During the summer he wrote out a plan about what he would need to do to get it all started when he was back in Canada, but in the fall, the Student Christian Movement posted a notice that they were hiring someone to start a club at the University of Ottawa. “This seems like it’s perfectly aligned,” Adair thought. He applied, got the job and began working a couple of hours a week to get it up and running.

He describes the group’s first year as fairly active. “We held a prayer service for Palestine and Lebanon in November that had about 20 to 30 people show up, including members of the Ottawa Palestinian Christian community. And that was hosted at St. Albans, so we were very grateful that St. Albans was able to give us that space,” Adair said.

The group also co-organized an event in February on migrant workers with the Filipino group Migrante. “I thought that it made sense considering we have so many international students and so many people on campus from around the world to do an event about migrant workers and international students.”

In March, they hosted an online discussion with two theologians, Dr. Michel Andraos and Dr. Jane Barter, discussing the roots of Christian Zionism in Canada. And prior to the federal election, the SCM group worked with the campus chaplaincy and Citizens for Public Justice to host an event called Engaging Faithfully for the Common Good about connecting Christian faith with political engagement.

In June, Adair travelled to Calgary to participate in the G7 Jubilee People’s Forum, organized by KAIROS Canada, which took place from June 15 to 17. KAIROS gathered pilgrims and activists from across Canada and the world to discuss their visions for global economic, environmental and social justice, with a focus on Jubilee 2025, a global initiative to cancel debt for low-income countries. Adair received a travel grant from the World Student Christian Federation’s Lois Freeman Wilson Fund. Wilson, who was active in SCM in her youth, went on to become the first woman to serve as Moderator of the United Church of Canada, the first Canadian president of the World Council of Churches, and a Canadian senator.

“It’s been interesting seeing like how large SCM used to be and the goodwill from that,” Adair says, noting that he’s met many supportive alumni.

Starting the campus SCM chapter has been really fulfilling, Adair said. It was challenge was to build from the ground up because contemporary students had no knowledge of the organization. “It’s been interesting trying to explain it to people and get them involved,” he said. “I think they see Student Christian Movement, and they’re skeptical because it sounds like something that might be scary for a lot of people.”

The new chapter drew interest from a diverse mix of students, he said. ‘It’s some very devout Christians who have never really done political work or activist work in their lives, and then some political activists who maybe went to church when they were kids but who wouldn’t think of themselves as Christian, but they’re interested in the work that SCM is doing.” Both groups have seen value in connecting their faith with action, such as feeding the hungry, caring for others, he says. “We even have one or two Muslim members and one or two like atheist members who say, ‘I just like going to your events. You do interesting stuff.’”

Adair says he invited a friend who he knew used to go to church to a prayer service. “They went and they hadn’t been to church since they went to university, and I think probably before that. But now they’re back home for the summer, and they’re leading a church group back home. I don’t want to say it’s because of SCM, but I think they were having a crisis of faith [questioning},’What is the value of this in this world currently?’”

He suggests that might be true more broadly. “For the prayer service for Palestine and Lebanon, we were able to get about 30 people in a church on the Friday evening during exam season. People didn’t have to be there, and a lot of people personally inconvenienced themselves to go to that, so I think that’s something maybe church leaders should listen to. People want that connection and the community. … I don’t think people want to see a church that retreats away from the world or away from the world’s questions. They want to see a church that is saying, ‘You’re right. This is scary. This is hard, but also we can do something about it right now.”

More information on the work of the UOttawa SCM can be found at @uottawascm on Instagram.

Related reading;

G7 People’s Forum inspires faith and action

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The Centretown Food Centre (CCFC), located at 370 Catherine Street, serves more than 1500 people each month, including a large number of children.  Like all the food banks in Ottawa, they are in constant need of more food and money to meet the growing need. CCFC is accessible. The friendly staff and volunteers make it a welcoming place for everyone.

CCSAC (Centretown Churches Social Action Committee) is a collective of 22 churches in downtown Ottawa, including nine in Centretown.  CCSAC founded the Food Centre in 1978, and it remains its principal project today.  Many of the volunteers are members of our local churches.  CCSAC’s main fundraising event is the annual Walk for the Centre. This year’s Walk will begin at Canadian Martyrs Church, 100 Main Street, at 1:30 pm. A short opening ceremony will have lively music and inspiring speakers. Immediately after the official start, the Sons of Scotland Pipe Band will lead the walkers out the door and on to the 2-4 km walk from the church to Pretoria Bridge and west to Queen Elizabeth Pathway. This is a real community event, as well as a way to highlight the food insecurity facing so many of our neighbours right now. A number of local businesses sponsor the walk with generous financial donations and prizes.

Online donations can be made at www.centretownchurches.org/walkathon and a receipt will be issued immediately.  Donations can also be made by cheque (made payable to CCSAC) at the registration desk on Oct. 5 or mailed to CCSAC at 507 Bank Street, Ottawa, K2P 1Z5.  Receipts will be issued for donations over $20.

Looking forward to seeing you at our 10^th annual Walk for the Centre 2025!

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This is what the community of Christ Church Bells Corners (CCBC) decided to do this summer. We have joined a growing number of church communities from across the world who have launched a ‘Forest Church’ as a unique expression of our faith tradition that takes place outdoors.

The Diocese of Norwich (U.K.) defines Forest Church in this way; “Forest Church is a type of outdoor worship and spiritual practice that emphasizes connecting with nature and finding spiritual meaning in the natural world. It’s a contemporary movement with roots in Christian traditions that highlight nature and creation, like Celtic and Franciscan approaches, and aims to engage with God through the natural world.”

On the last Monday of each month, 15 to 20 people have gathered at one of three different NCC trails to worship and share Holy Communion. We have been joined by newcomers who have heard about Forest Church through social media (including a young man who had never been to a church service before in his life), fauna (including an amazing encounter with the Barred Owl seen in the picture above), perplexed onlookers, trees and wildflowers.

We gather first in the trail parking lot and ensure that we have bug spray and water and hand out bulletins. We then chat about existing shared knowledge about the trail that we are about to embark on. We don’t pre-plan where our altar will be but discuss as a group what makes sense in light of the temperature and the abilities of those who have gathered on any particular evening. We adapt as we go (even if it means stopping because someone finds a rare wildflower, pausing the Eucharistic prayer on account of the beautiful snakes curling around the bullrushes, or taking a different path because someone knows that there are nesting owls that we might catch a glimpse of).

With an opening prayer and a reading from scripture we enter the trail with intentions to observe the space around us and to walk together in fellowship and friendship. When we find a place to create an altar (usually at about the half-way mark of our walk) we prepare the elements and circle around to participate in the rhythm and ritual of our tradition. After the meal is shared, we head back and conclude with a closing prayer, blessing and dismissal.

The origins of Forest Church are often attributed to Bruce Stanley who is author of a book entitled; Forest Church: A Field Guide to Nature Connection for Groups and Individuals in which he provides an overview of an emerging trend that began in the U.K. in 2012 to take Christian worship outdoors. My own introduction to Forest Church happened when I met the Rev. Stephen Blackmer at the Re:Generate Fellowship Program through Wake Forest Divinity; a program that brought together church leaders interested in creation spirituality, environmental concerns, and food justice. Stephen created the Church of the Woods, a ministry connected with Episcopal Church of the United States that defines 106 acres of wild woods and wetlands in Canterbury, New Hampshire as an outdoor church. Today, Forest Church communities connect together through a Facebook Page with close to six thousand members from across the world.

Bells Corners is often referred to as an ‘island’ due to the community’s three-sided boundary created by the Stony Swamp Conservation Area of Ottawa’s Greenbelt. The fourth side of the suburb is Highway 417, stretching across the north end. This unique boundary has influenced the context and culture of Bells Corners since its inception in the early 1800s and continues to influence the use of community space today. During the COVID pandemic, the many NCC pathways that are accessed via Moodie Drive became a place of safe refuge for outdoor community gathering and connection. For parishioners at CCBC, the surrounding path network has been a place of spiritual connection for many years, and so the thought of using these lands for outdoor Anglican worship was an exciting idea that pulled together 16 individuals for the initial brainstorming meeting. Each service has been an amazing opportunity to use the richness of our tradition in the midst of creation.

Originally our team committed to four Forest Church services beginning in May and we have now extended to six services by adding September and October to the calendar (with hopes and prayers that we will not hit the 39-degree temperature we experienced at our July service). All are welcome at Forest Church and information can be found on our website: https://christchurchbellscorners.ca/forestchurch/. We promise it will be sacred, imperfect and beautiful and that together we will worship God, share bread and wine, and pray together.

For a bit more inspiration, here’s a link to Wendell Berry’s reading of his poem ‘The Peace of Wild Things.’

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Timed to coincide with the 80th anniversary of that horrific history, the subject’s relevance was underlined as the U.S. and Russia, which both possess nuclear arsenals, engaged in armed conflict. The exhibit was organized by Ban the Bomb Ottawa (BtBO) and the United Nations in Canada’s National Capital Region Branch [UNA-Canada (NCR Branch)]. BtBO is a group of individuals from faith-based, nongovernmental and local community organizations and groups working for peace and nuclear disarmament. Debbie Grisdale, a parishioner at Church of the Ascension in Ottawa, is a member and played a key role in organizing the exhibit.

Grisdale explained that the posters were donated by the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, thanks to the intervention of Setsuko Thurlow, who survived the bombing of Hiroshima as a 13-year-old schoolgirl and later immigrated to Canada where she has worked tirelessly for the abolition of nuclear weapons with several organizations including Voices of Women, the Canadian Council of Churches and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

She thanked the Rev. Canon Gary van der Meer, incumbent at St. John’s for opening the church doors to the exhibit.

Van der Meer said that when she first asked about using the church as a space for the exhibit, he thought, “This aligns with what I hope will happen at St. John’s, which is we will take very seriously that we pray for peace because we are surrounded by non-peace in our news, in our streets…. So I like very much that we have these posters in here, and that they remind us not just of the sacrifice and the loss, but of the calling for peace.”

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Think Indigenous: Native American Spirituality for a Modern World by Doug Good Feather
This insightful work, authored by a Lakota elder, offers readers a way to connect with their own innate spirituality. Doug Good Feather explains the difference between appreciating and appropriating cultural practices and describes the Native American Medicine Wheel teachings for the seven directions and their related virtues. He also offers suggestions for those who wish to apply these concepts to the challenges we currently face in the modern world. The book addresses conscious living, mindful consumption, and living in community with others.

Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by Monique Gray Smith (Adapted from Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass)
This book combines Indigenous teachings with scientific understanding, focusing on the relationship between humans and the natural world. The author’s deep respect for plants and their teachings is a beautiful reminder of the importance of reciprocity and interconnectedness – key themes for reconciliation and environmental stewardship. The discussion of the Windigo offers a perspective on reconciliation that encourages us to seek a deeper kind of love and connection that is not always emphasized in dominant cultural narratives. Adapted for young people with illustrations and highlighted comments and questions, this book speaks to readers of all ages.

Permanent Astonishment by Tomson Highway
A deeply personal and moving account of growing up in a Cree family in northern Manitoba, this memoir is a beautiful exploration of how Indigenous culture persists in the face of adversity. Tomson Highway paints a vivid picture of his childhood, rich with spiritual connections, humour, strong family bonds, and a deep relationship with the natural world, while also confronting the enduring impacts of the residential school system.

21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act by Bob Joseph
This book is essential reading for anyone looking to better understand the legal framework that has shaped the relationship between Indigenous peoples and Canada. Bob Joseph explains the historical and current impacts of the Indian Act in a clear and accessible way, offering insights into the systemic injustices that persist today.

The Reason You Walk by Wab Kinew

A powerful and endearing memoir that reflects on the author’s relationship with his father, a respected medicine man, and his own journey as a political leader and advocate for Indigenous rights. Wab Kinew explores themes of family, reconciliation, and cultural healing, sharing his struggles with addiction, stories of personal growth, and the impact of his father’s legacy.

Affiliated with the All My Relations Circle at the Anglican Diocese of Ottawa, the Journeying as Allies reading group welcomes readers of all backgrounds. Meeting four times a year, both in person and online, we discuss a mix of fiction, non-fiction, and young adult titles by Indigenous authors. These conversations deepen our understanding of Indigenous cultures, histories, and the challenges facing communities today, while helping us become better allies and advocates for reconciliation. To learn more or to join our mailing list, contact allmyrelations@ottawa.anglican.ca. 

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“In my short time here,… I have already noticed how well parishioners, who came from the separate churches originally part of the parish, work together, and how well parishioners who have joined St Clare’s after the new building was built have been integrated into the life of the community,” said the Rev. Jonathan Askwith, incumbent.

As people began arriving for the service, a sense of excitement permeated the building. Congregational leaders were busy greeting people, members of the church’s catering ministry were making last minute preparations for the dinner following the anniversary service, while guests and members of the congregation renewed acquaintances.

As the service began, Rector’s Warden Arlene Armstrong; the Rev. Jonathan Askwith, incumbent of St. Clare’s; Regional Dean of East Ontario, the Rev. Mark Lewis; the Ven. Rhonda Waters, Archdeacon of East Ontario and Bishop Shane Parker processed to the front of the church’s nave.

The bishop blessed the baptismal font, pulpit and altar. Music was provided by members of St. Clare’s music team Judy Hilson, Shawn Snider, Susan Rutters and Tracy, Ezra and Silas Van Gilst.

“I am very optimistic for St. Clare’s. It is a beautiful, practical and efficient building with a congregation and a priest who are willing to do whatever it takes to thrive,” said the bishop.

A delicious dinner had been prepared by members of the congregation and was served in buffet style after the service with ample opportunity to talk with friends new and old.  Memories of a joyous celebration of a decade of service by members of St. Clare’s Church will remain with those who attended.

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