Church has been centre of community for 100 years
There was cake and memories as St. George’s Anglican Church in West Kelowna celebrated its 100th anniversary with a high tea Saturday. Over the past 100 years, what began as an isolated small country parish has evolved into a downtown urban church fronted by a busy highway.
St. George’s, in what is now West Kelowna, was established after St. George’s Church of England in Camberwell celebrated its centenary by gifting $2,500 Canadian to the Diocese of Kootenay for the establishment of a new parish building.
St. George’s, named after the patron saint of England, was consecrated on Main Street two years later.
On display during Saturday’s celebration were the gleaming brass candlestick holders and cross gifted to the church from Camberwell in 1924, which usually grace the altar, as well as the gasoline lamps used to light the church before electricity came to Main Street in 1944.
When the Okanagan Lake Bridge opened in the late 1950s, Westbank was no longer isolated.
The population on the Westside began to grow, as did the congregation at St. George’s.
In 1967, St. George’s added a small hall. The church expanded the hall in 1982 and added a basement. In 1985, a new wing was added.
These days, St. George’s is shaded by mature trees, which have their own stories. An oak tree was planted in 1953 to commemorate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Almeda Paynter, one of the original parishioners, planted the line of trees along the highway. There was no water on the property, so Paynter had to bring buckets of water for the trees.
The church building is not the only thing that has seen change over the last century.
Liz Taylor was 10 years old when she began to attend St. Georges in 1967, dressed in her Sunday best.
The community was agricultural then, with orchards where familiar commercial buildings sit today.
St. George’s used the Common Book of Prayer, “which when I was 10 was the most boring thing on the face of the earth,” Taylor chuckled, adding she would fidget like mad.
These days Taylor said the church offers modern music and greater inclusivity.
After moving back to the Westside from Alberta in 1989, she found St. George’s was using a more upbeat and easier-tounderstand service. Church attire had become more relaxed as some people wore jeans to church.
Dorothy and Bill Genge joined St. George’s in the early 1980s.
Before the addition was built, there were so many children attending St. George’s, they had to rent extra space for Sunday school.
The Genges fondly remember the annual family camp at Okanagan Anglican Camp on Westside Road, which was destroyed by fire last summer. Families would come with their campers or stay in the cabins or tents and spend the weekend enjoying food, playing games and relaxing with a Sunday service.
June Brown, who has been at St. George’s for 22 years, remembers when St. George’s hosted the Festival of Lights and Music, with choirs coming from other churches.
While the initial gift from England was for a parish building, members of St. George’s emphasize their favourite part of the church is its people.
“We’re very friendly, supportive like a family and caring for each other,” said Dorothy.
There are 70 to 80 parishioners at St. George’s with an average of 45 coming to the Sunday service.
As other churches report declining congregations, Rev. Jacqueline Eaton, who has been rector at St. George’s since 2021, said the numbers have been holding steady, with an upward trend.
Many of St. George’s members are more mature, but Eaton is not concerned, saying building a congregation is about building relationships.
“It’s not just about the young people,” she said. “It’s about opening people’s hearts to their lives of faith, and that can come at any age. Maybe it’s less about stressing about no families and more how do we connect with people in their 50s and 60s.”
While acknowledging the adventurous sprit of pioneers who came to a new country, Lynne McNaughton, bishop for the Kootenay Diocese, said the church recognizes its colonial past.
“I would say that we’re still repenting of what we came with and as we try to embrace the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the 94 Calls to Action to undo the wrongs that we brought, trying to bring English culture into a different setting with all of the tragedy of the residential schools,” she said.