Church communities raise a minister

As the saying goes, it takes a village to raise a child. In Huntingdon, an extended church community has now raised a minister. The now Reverend Eric Pagé was ordained on Saturday, May 26, during a Celebration of Ministries Service in Hudson. The following day, he gave his first sermon at the Huntingdon United Church, where he grew up as a treasured member of the community. As one of only a handful of new ministers officially ordained by the Montreal and Ottawa Conference of the United Church of Canada, the Celebration of Ministries Service was the culmination of eight years of schooling for Eric Pagé, though he also credits his family and extended community in guiding him to accept this important calling. Throughout his journey, he contributed actively to the church congregations at both the Huntingdon United Church and Rennie’s United Church as well as the Huntingdon and Athelstan Presbyterian Churches and several others throughout the Valley. All were invited to enjoy his first service on May 27. “It’s a big relief to finally be done,” says Pagé, who will be leaving the region shortly to accept a call at a church near Calgary. That is, after he marries his long-time love Michelle in British Co-lumbia in June. “I originally wanted to be a teacher,” he admits, but began to consider ministry after Reverend Scott Hunter, who had been at Huntingdon and Rennie’s United at the time, encouraged him to continue to ask the all-important questions he had been struggling with around the Church, religion and his role within these institutions. For the people of the Valley churches, he says he has nothing but gratitude for their support in all the practical aspects of ministry but “more importantly for inviting me into their lives.” One big family “I approached Eric’s father four years ago about what I wanted to make for a stole,” says Marlene Harvey, of the gift she presented to Eric for his ordination. Several other members of the Huntingdon United Church also presented him with handmade stoles to accompany him to Alberta as a reminder of the community he will always have back home. “We have enjoyed watching him grow from a young boy into this amazing man,” adds Harvey. “It’s like we are a big family and he was so well supported in the community here. We are very proud of him,” she smiles. “This was just amazing,” notes Susan Erskine, who remembers a very nervous young man who kept looking at the clock during his early sermons at Rennie’s United. “Then today he was such a confidant ordained minister,” she smiles wistfully, before adding that on behalf of Rennie’s, the congregation wishes him all the best. “He’s a homegrown boy,” says Yvette Harper of the Huntingdon Presbyterian Church. “We have seen him progress to become somebody who just engages everybody there,” she adds. “It was his calling and it is wonderful to see that he has followed it.”