International Association for Religious Freedom

Phillip Hewett

Canadian involvement was on a small scale before the past three decades, though in 1931 a statement from Canada prompted an IARF declaration on what was then its attitude toward faiths other than Christianity. The Canadian Unitarian Council, formed in 1961, became an IARF member-group in 1972, and the following Congress was held in Montreal. Since that time, Canadian attendance at Congresses has consistently been among the largest from any member-group, and Canadians have played an increasingly prominent role in IARF work.

Canadian involvement in IARF has been almost exclusively confined to the second half of the century, and, until very recently, to Unitarians. In the earlier period, Canadian Unitarians were few in numbers and not well enough organized to have significant international involvement. The widely scattered congregations were affiliated both with the British and Foreign Unitarian Association and with the American Unitarian Association, but had no national organization of their own.

The IARF had an early and indirect impact upon Canada as a result of these pre-existing affiliations. The official delegates from Britain to the 1907 Congress in Boston traveled by way of Canada and made a point of visiting all the congregations. In Boston they consulted with their American colleagues, and the result was a jointly sponsored project for Unitarian extension in Western Canada.

Individual Canadians attended some of the early Congresses, but made no distinctive contribution, nor was there any constituency to which they could report back at home. A minor ripple occurred in 1931, which anticipated the evolution of IARF by some decades. An organization had been created under the name of the Canadian Conference of Universalists, Unitarians and Kindred Relgious Liberals. Despite this long and somewhat pretentious title, this consisted in practice of a little group of Universalists from Quebec and the Maritime Provinces, gathered by one energetic organizer, Charles Pennoyer. The IARF had just made one of its many changes of name, and Pennoyer took exception to the most recent one: International Association for the Promotion of Liberal Christianity and Religious Freedom. His conference passed a resolution of protest, saying that the singling out of Christianity for special mention was discriminatory, and urging a return to the name of International Congress of Religious Liberals.

The protest was duly noted in the Secretariat's quarterly report for March 1932 (on notepaper headed by a logo including the letters I.A.L.C.). Professor van Holk replied on their behalf, pointing out to the Canadians that the name of the Association had not only varied from Congress to Congress but had also been variously rendered in the respective languages of its member-groups, so the question was not one of returning to an earlier generally accepted name. The rationale for the new name was primarily one of tactics and organization. The immediate need which the Association was in a position to address was for the promotion of a liberal spirit within Christianity, as one step in the direction of 'a worldwide union of all the forms of liberal religion'.

'It has always been the idea of the leaders of our movement', continued the statement, 'to start at the different historical forms of religion and to find a way towards unity in the spirit of liberty and tolerance even while these different historical forms remain, as they too belong to the essentials of religious life. That is why the present name of our international organisation should not in the least be felt as a limitation of scope. No less than before the importance of perpetual contacts with other religions is realised. But the world is not helped with a vague and dreamy sort of idealism that overlooks the real situation and denies the varieties in religion. It is our task as indeed it has always been to work toward international cooperation of liberal Christianity in its various national forms-and of liberal Christianity with the "left wings" of the other religions.'

At its meeting the following year, the 'Canadian Conference' noted that 'though pleasing in its spirit, this answer is not at all satisfactory as to the question of the universal fellowship and unity of religions', that their own proposal 'has nothing to do with erasing differences between the religions, except as the sense of the symphony of all religions gives a place to all thinkers and doers of good', and that 'neither pure Christianity nor any other true religion has anything to lose but everything to gain, by this sense and practice of the universal unity.'

There the matter ended, as this was the last conference held by the organization in question.

During the 1950s a groundswell gained momentum which would eventually bring the Canadian Unitarian Council into being as a national organization in 1961. But at the time of the 1958 Congress in Chicago, official participation from Canada was limited to the inclusion of one Canadian in the delegation from the American Unitarian Association, as had been the practice for some years. There was resentment in some quarters that such appointments were made in Boston without consultations in Canada, but since there was no organized body in Canada with which to consult, the policy was at least understandable. In the same way, the long list of sponsors of the Congress included two Canadians who had responded to an invitation from the AUA: Brock Chisholm and Lester Pearson. Neither actually attended, but there were nineteen Canadians in attendance, and awareness of the IARF in Canada had grown, because 65 delegates from Europe had arrived by sea in Montreal and had been entertained both by the congregation there and by the one in Toronto on their way to Chicago.

Three months before the next Congress the Canadian Unitarian Council came into existence. One of the actions taken at its founding meeting was to consider its relationship to the IARF, and its board was authorized to begin negotiations for membership if this seemed appropriate. The Canadian member of the delegation from the equally newly formed Unitarian Universalist Association had already been appointed, but it was voted to send an observer from the CUC to the 1961 Davos Congress to report back with recommendations. Douglas Borden from the Montreal congregation was chosen. His report to the November board meeting recommended that the CUC apply for membership and promote IARF in Canada. The CUC would then represent Canada at IARF events in the future; North American 'continental' groups, he added, inevitably appear to all outsiders as '100 percent American.' The board thereupon voted to seek IARF membership.

Difficulties, however, arose. The UUA, as a powerful presence within IARF, opposed the application on the grounds that the Canadian churches were already represented through having a member on its own delegation. Lengthy discussions followed. It was pointed out the the IARF was an organization of national member-groups, and that the Canadian situation was parallel to that in South Africa, Australia and Ireland, where the national associations had IARF membership although their congregations were also members of the British General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches, as indeed the Canadian one were too. The Americans did not budge. All that could be agreed upon after further negotiations was that they would not oppose a CUC application for associate membership. In 1966 the CUC annual meeting endorsed such an application, together with a recommendation that they be consulted with regard to the UUA appointment of a Canadian member of its own delegation; they also appointed their own observer to the upcoming Congress.

The stalemate continued. In 1969 a protest was lodged that the UUA had again appointed a Canadian delegate without consultation with the CUC. By this time relationships between the two bodies had become strained over a number of issues, and a vote that Canada should withdraw completely from the UUA was narrowly defeated at that year's CUC meetings. This marked the turning-point. Joint consultations looked at the Canadian grievances, and the UUA agreed not only to withdraw its opposition to CUC membership in IARF but to sponsor it. The following year's CUC meetings voted to renew the application, which was placed before the 1972 Congress in Heidelberg, where it was unanimously accepted.

Loose ends had still to be tied up. On more than one subsequent occasion Canadians again received notice of appointment as UUA delegates to IARF Congresses. One of the anomalies in the 1969 situation was that the planning committee for the Congress was chaired by a Canadian as a UUA representative, as a by-product of the situation that this was being planned as a joint gathering with the UUA General Assembly, and he was already chair of the planning committee for that Assembly. By this time, too, a North American Chapter had been established on a continent-wide basis for individual IARF members. Early in 1970 the chapter applied for affiliation with the CUC, which prompted an investigation of the existing situation. It was discovered that the chapter had only five Canadian members; when they were consulted, the consensus was that now that the CUC was a member they would prefer individual membership through it rather than through the chapter, so it was recommended that to avoid confusion the latter rename itself simply the American chapter.

The Heidelberg Congress of 1972 was a momentous occasion for Canadians, though only nine of them were able to attend. They were received into membership and represented for the first time by their own elected delegates, Phillip Hewett and Jean Cumming. These delegates presented an invitation for the following Congress, in 1975, to be held in Montreal, and this was enthusiastically accepted. It was mentioned that this was a particularly appropriate choice, since two of the IARF's major member-groups, the British and the American Unitarian associations, were both celebrating their 150th anniversary that year, and the Canadians were members of both. Not only that, but it also marked the 75th anniversary of the IARF. A further Canadian contribution at Heidelberg was a proposal by Charles Eddis for a worldwide annual IARF Day to promote awareness of the organization and raise money for its Emergency Relief Fund. This too was accepted.

Preparations for the Montreal Congress now became a major preoccupation for Canadian Unitarians. A fund of more than $6000 was raised to help cover expenses, and a local committee worked long hours to cover the practical details. When the time arrived, over three hundred liberal Christians, Buddhists, Hindus and Muslims as well as Unitarians and Unitarian Universalists gathered on the campus of McGill University; the theme was 'Our Unity in Diversity'. One consequence of the event was that Canadian attendance at congresses from that point onward was consistently among the largest of all national groups: 41, for instance, made it to Tokyo in 1984. Another outcome was the formation of a Canadian chapter, energetically promoted by Margaret Hewett, which by 1990 had gathered well over a hundred individual members. The CUC annual meetings always included an event sponsored by the IARF chapter.

Canadians also began to play a more prominent role in IARF proceedings. Up to that time, practically the only occasion when a Canadian name had been before the entire constituency was when an article by Phillip Hewett on 'Liberation and the Liberal' had been published in 1971 in the IARF newsletter. For the 1987 Congress, Marilyn Flitton from Vancouver was on the planning committee, while three of the working groups had before them papers prepared by Canadians Joyce Griffiths, Sheilah Thompson and Phillip Hewett. The last-named also chaired the committee that framed the Congress Declaration. The Canadians contributed a worship service on 'A Sense of Place' at the Congress, which included a contextual use of art and poetry. Again in 1990, Joyce Griffiths prepared a paper for one of the working groups, and in 1996 Harold Rosen and Phillip Hewett did the same. From the latter Congress, Ellen Campbell, executive director of the CUC, was elected to the IARF Council.

Now, at the time of writing, Canada looks forward once again to playing host to an IARF Congress. Just as the 75th anniversary of the organization was marked in Montreal, so its centenary will be marked in Vancouver. Over the intervening quarter of a century, the constituency of the IARF has become much broader, vindicating the hopes expressed by Charles Pennoyer in 1931, and the same has certainly been true of the energetic working committee gathered by Harold Rosen in preparation for the 1999 Congress. Canada, with an increasingly multicultural and multifaith population, can both learn from and contribute to the ongoing IARF tradition.

Phillip Hewett is minister emeritus of the Unitarian Church of Vancouver, where he served as minister for 35 years. He ministered briefly in England before moving to Canada in 1956. He has attended most IARF Congresses since 1952, usually as a Canadian delegate. He was chair of the planning committee for the 1969 Congress and of the committee to prepare the Congress Declaration in 1987. In 1983 he and his wife Margaret were joint recipients of the Award for Outstanding Service to International Liberal Religion presented by the American chapter of IARF.