A story of a maverick: David Craig challenged the church.

The Life and

Thought of

David Craig

1937-2001:

Canadian Presbyterian

Missionary

By Jason Zuidema

Texts and Studies in

Protestant History

and Thought in Quebec--Volume 2

Toronto (Clements Academic), 2008.

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David Craig was an original; a craggy, feisty, opinionated and occasionally obstinate Canadian whose ministry among francophones was the latest in a string of Presbyterian attempts to speak to francophone Quebec. He challenged the church at large to think outside the box. His untimely death robbed the Christian community in Canada of a creative and unusual witness. His inability to accommodate himself--and the other Reformed francophone churches within his orbit-to the demands of the Presbyterian Church in Canada meant that we also lost someone who had the potential of making our denomination a truly national body.

Jason Zuidema, a minister in the Eglise Reformee de Quebec (which Craig helped to inaugurate when he left the PCC), tells Craig's story well. He spares nothing in the narrative of a boy who grew up bee-keeping in rural Ontario. The Craig family were Christian Brethren, but David came to the Reformed faith while at university in Waterloo, moving outside the margins of his childhood fundamentalism with its narrow cultural and religious boundaries.

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At Presbyterian College, where he studied for the ministry, Craig was a maverick. It was while there that he met his remarkable wife Nancy who is a large part of his story. Her Christian Brethren medical father had come from Ontario to evangelise in francophone Quebec at a time when there was strident opposition to Protestantism. Nancy's missionary roots led the newly married couple out to Nigeria on graduation. There, working among the Ibos, they were caught up in the Biafran secession and the machinations of E. H. Johnson. Craig barely escaped with his life and his miraculous reprieve from death made head lines in Canada.

He came back, served briefly among youth at Fairview, Vancouver, took doctoral studies in Neuchatel Switzerland, and then was sent by the Presbyterian Mission Board to the tiny and struggling Eglise St, Marc, Quebec City. It was a heady time for outreach by Protestants among the Quebecois, whose religious devotion had been challenged by secularism and la revolution tranquille. Craig attracted a large number of keen students to his ministry.

It is at the point of his departure from the Presbyterian Church, and the events that led up to it, and the separation that ensued, the Jason Zuidema's mettle as an historian is seen. He is even-handed and takes no side in what can only be described as a tragedy for both Craig and the Presbyterian Church. Craig's sudden death at the age of 63 provided no opportunity for raprochement or reconciliation. This biography is a must read for any who follow the story of French evangelisation from its earliest roots in 19th century Canadian Presbyterianism to the present religious vacuum in Quebec. It is an account that has lessons for all of us in our denomination as we struggle with maintaining our unity amidst increasing theological diversity and cultural accommodation.

Rev. Don Macleod's latest book is C. Stacey Woods and the Evangelical Rediscovery of the University.