Quebec Alive moments

We continue our recollections of the evangelistic outreach in Quebec with Murray Heron (third from left) who joined the evangelistic outreach in the mining towns of northwestern Quebec in 1947. He was a 22-year old fresh out of seminary.  He had been a Christian for less than 4 years and became the pastor of the English-speaking church in Rouyn-Noranda. Shortly after his arrival, he began to speak in open-air meetings in French and to visit French-speaking contacts resulting from radio and literature outreach.  Soon afterwards his church became a bilingual church.  The next year Murray’s brother, Lorne (second from left), accepted the call to an English-speaking church in the same region at Val d’Or.  Soon his church also became bilingual.  The two brothers persevered amid fierce opposition from the Roman Catholic Church in the late 40’s and early 50s.  Cars were burned and church windows smashed.  Fire hoses, tomatoes, fire crackers and tractor horns were all used to disrupt open-air meetings.  In some areas mail was even confiscated and New Testaments were gathered up by the opposition and burned.  There was physical violence and there were arrests with time spent in jail.  However, this opposition did not stop the Word of God from being given to the Quebecers.

A couple of weeks ago we had a dedication gathering for the naming of the Evangelical Baptist Churches of Quebec Association building in honor of William Phillips (wife, Blanche pictured far right), who was one of the early pioneers to reach into Quebec with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  It was a blessing to recall William Phillips’ ministry (more on this in a later Quebec Alive Moment) and to have so many of the early pioneers gathered together (picture) at one time.  Their presence ignited many recollections of those early days.  In the next few weeks the Quebec Alive Moment will revisit some of those early times.  Wilfred Wellington was one of the earliest to begin reaching out into Quebec.  He began in 1937 with open-air preaching, door-to-door visitations and literature distribution in the French-speaking mining towns of northwestern Quebec.  In the same year, Tom Carson became the pastor of an English-speaking church in Montreal and the next year he moved his family to Drummondville where he established a bilingual ministry.  At the end of the 30s there were these two missionary couples and one unorganized church.  It was a small beginning, but the beginning of reaching Quebec for Christ.