Verdun United Church
The other day I was watching a program on TV that showed how a family turned a beautiful old church they bought into their home. It made me think of when I lived back east there was a fine Greek restaurant we used to go to for special occasions, and it was once a church.
There was a time that a town's social life centered around the church. Not so today. Attendance is waning and every year churches are closing in cities and villages all over the world.
My Mom's cousin lives in a small town in the west, and don't ask me how, but she knows everything that is going on that has anything however remotely to do with the family, even in the east. She called one day to tell me that the church our grandparents went to all their lives was being sold. Sold?? What about the beautiful windows? Both my grandfather's and my grandmother's families had commissioned stained glass windows for the Verdun United Church. My grandmother's family had one made in honour of her father who, while repairing the roof of that same church fell off and died from his injuries, and her grandmother, Mrs Elizabeth (Nichols) King. My grandfather's family commissioned a window to honour his father Alexander Mavor and his brother Alexander George, who died in the trenches during WWI.
SouthWest United Church, Verdun
Contacting the church I discovered the congregation was moving to the Crawford Park United Church, and so were the windows. With the 2 congregations merging, the church changed it's name to the SouthWest United Church. Once the windows were installed they had a big ceremony, to which I was invited, but I could not make it at that time. The woman I spoke to there kindly took photos for me. So our family windows were saved for now, but what about next time? Will anyone care in years to come?
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