Members of the Living Spirit United Church gathered together with other community members to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the United Church in Canada last weekend.

Erin Hickman, one of the organizers of the event, says the celebration was a success with about 80 guests attending.

The organizers decided to go with a tea and some keynote speakers to mark the important date. They also brought in harpist Rhiannon Gressler to provide some music.

Former Canadian Girls In Training member, Dawn Cartwright, was knitting at the event. Hickman says that Cartwright and Emily Hickman have both knitted and crocheted shawls for the Prayer Shawl Ministry in the past.

“We really appreciated the wonderful turnout and the support of the folks that we saw,” says Hickman.

The Church’s Pastoral Charge Supervisor, Reverend Lynn Mackie, and her husband drove from Edmonton to attend.

“They gave opening remarks, introduced us and what we were doing and why we were doing it,” says Hickman.

The Reverend also spoke about some of the history behind the United Church.

“The United Church was actually formed by an Act of Parliament in 1925,” says Hickman.

That Act combined four different churches, the Presbyterian Church, the Methodist Church, the Congregational Churches of Canada and the General Council of Local Union Churches, into the United Church of Canada.

She says the members of Living Spirit started planning the event in the fall. The group decided on a tea at the Clean Energy Technology Centre.

Hickman says some churches planned large events or projects, but the Living Spirit Church, which is the second iteration of the United Church in Drayton Valley, has a small congregation and didn’t have the resources to put on a big celebration.

Hickman says they reached out to many people with an invitation. Along with some guests from other congregations in the community, there were former members of CGIT, and other people who had been associated with the church in the past.

She says she believes that Living Spirit is the newest United Church in the country, and probably the smallest, so having a celebration of the anniversary was very important to them.

Part of the reason was that they wanted people to know that even though the previous church closed its doors, there was still a United Church in the community.

“[We just wanted to] celebrate that milestone, and to share it with other people, too,” she says.

Hickman says Living Spirit will always welcome anyone who wishes to attend one of their services. Right now, they are live-streaming services from other churches as they don’t have a Minister, but they still gather in their sanctuary.

Those who are interested in attending can either attend at 5141 54 street on a Sunday morning for the service at 10:30 a.m. If anyone would like more information about the church, they can reach out to livingspirituniteddv@gmail.com.