Interlake Unitarians

The Arborg Unitarian Church

Palmi Palsson (1995)

The first meeting to organize the Sambands Söfnuður Ísleninga í Árborg (the Federated Congregation of
Icelanders at Arborg) took place on April 15, 1923 at the home of Kristján Bjarnason in Arborg. Those
present were from the village and surrounding rural area, and they all had Icelandic roots. They elected
a provisional board which chose a committee of three to draft the bylaws. On September 9, 1923,
Reverend Ragnar Kvaran conducted a worship service in the Order of Good Templars Hall in Arborg.
After that first service, the bylaws were read, discussed, and adopted. This became the founding date
of the congregation and the following directors were elected: Dr. Sveinn Björnsson (President), Kristján
Bjarnason (Vice-President), Guðmundur Einarsson (Secretary), Eddi Johnson, Thór Lifman, Emma
Eyolfson, and Johanna Nordal.

When the Arborg Church was organized, there were many other Federated Churches in Manitoba. The
old bylaws show that the name, Federated was chosen because the churches were to be a federation
of Unitarian and other Liberal Christian churches. The congregation was established because the
theology of the local Lutheran congregations was too conservative for many Icelanders.

The Lutheran Church of Iceland was more liberal than its Canadian counterpart, closer in fact to the
Unitarian faith than to Canadian Lutheranism; in fact, the Icelandic Lutheran Church provided many of
the early pastors to the Federated Churches. All meetings of the Arborg Church were conducted and
recorded in Icelandic until 1953 when the transition to English was made, although English language
worship services had commenced before this date. The name of the church was changed to the
Unitarian Church of Arborg some years later.

For four years, the Arborg Federated Church met at the International Order of Good Templars Hall at
Arborg, and in 1927 the present church was built with the help of a loan from the American Unitarian
Association. In 1961, the interior of the church was completely remodeled, primarily through the
voluntary efforts of church members. In 1992, a new foundation was laid under the church and at the
same time the church was made wheelchair accessible.

The Ladies Aid of the church (Kvenfélag Sambandssafnaðar í Árborg), established in 1926, has made a
great contribution to Arborg. Its aims are to aid the congregation, to promote liberal religious views in
the community, and to help the needy. They cater local events, put on plays, dances, parties,
bazaars, ball games, and concerts to raise funds for the church and for the sick and needy in the area.
In particular the funds raised have gone to church upkeep, the Sunday School, refreshments for after
services and funerals, and to the Canadian Red Cross, children's dental clinics, blood donor clinics,
UNICEF, and local projects including a skating rink, the hospital, and a lodge for senior citizens.

Another priority of the Ladies Aid, from the earliest years, was to bring help and cheer to the sick and
to those suffering from disasters and mishaps. There are several instances in the minutes of occasions
when the Aid sent gifts to those who lost their homes to fire. The Ladies Aid has for years supported
the Unitarian Service Committee by monetary donations and by sponsoring annual clothing drives for
destitute children and adults overseas. Along with other Unitarian Ladies Aids in the area, the Arborg
group worked to establish and maintain the Hnausa Fresh Air Camp which opened in 1937 to provide a
vacation place at Lake Winnipeg for the children from the churches and also for children of poor families
in the area. The camp is the longest-established Unitarian Church Camp in Canada, but now it is rented
mostly to family groups with Unitarians getting preference.

A fiftieth anniversary party was held for the Arborg Unitarian Ladies Aid in 1976. The church was filled
to capacity with local people and visitors from afar, including five of the original charter members.
Women of the choir entertained with music, historical highlights were celebrated, and the Aid's
membership scroll was presented and placed in the church.

There are now six active churches located in the village of Arborg that serve its 1,100 residents plus
those in the surrounding rural area. The Arborg Unitarian Church never had a large congregation and at
the beginning the minister usually served four churches: the congregations of Gimli, Riverton, and
Ames, in addition to Arborg. The Reverend Eyjólfur Melan was minister from 1923 to 1926 and again
from 1933 to 1953. Many members remember his fine sermons which were educational and inspiring. He
was an excellent carpenter and built his own home in Riverton and also was in charge of building the
Hnausa Fresh Air Camp in the thirties.

The Reverend Thorgeir Jónsson came from Iceland to serve as minister from 1927 to 1930. From 1930
to 1933, the minister was Reverend Ragnar Kvaran, a very talented and gifted person and the only one
of these ministers that resided in Arborg. He added a great deal to the cultural atmosphere with his
ability in the field of drama.

A student minister, Allen Myrick, served for the summers of 1953 and 1954. For the next twenty-five
years the only minister to occasionally lead services and perform weddings, dedications, and funerals at
Arborg was the Reverend Dr. Philip Pétursson, Minister of the Winnipeg Unitarian Church. In 1976, the
Arborg Unitarian Congregation honoured Dr. Pétursson and his wife, Thorey, on their golden wedding
anniversary with a chrome tray, suitably inscribed to mark the occasion. The Riverton Unitarian Church
presented the Péturssons with a golden anniversary plate at the same time.

There have seldom been regular Sunday services at the Arborg Unitarian Church, sometimes only once
a month, or even less frequently, but for the past few years we have had a very good young chaplain,
Stefan Jonasson, and services are held twice a month. Last fall, the Arborg congregation celebrated its
seventieth anniversary with a fine lunch at the Arborg Community Hall where there was a large display
of pictures of church events through the years.

Postscript

It has been more than ten years since Palmi Palsson last revised his history of the Arborg Unitarian
Church for inclusion in Northern Lights, a history of the Unitarian Universalist congregations of Western
Canada District.

After many years of declining membership and infrequent activity, the 1991 decision to hold biweekly
services stabilized the church's membership and even led to some modest growth. Although attendance
is small in comparison with many UU congregations - averaging only a couple of dozen adults most
Sundays - it does represent a significant percentage of the community's population. An informal
children's program was re-established.

The congregation undertook a major renovation of the building that replaced the existing foundation,
increased space for the children's program, added indoor plumbing, remodeled the chancel, landscaped
the yard, and rendered the church fully accessible.

In 1991, the church assumed ownership of the Hnausa Unitarian Camp, a lakefront property along one
of finest beaches on the west side of Lake Winnipeg. Fully renovated in recent years, the camp
includes a spacious hall with a lakeside deck, camp sites, and a chapel, which was formerly the
Unitarian Church at Arnes.

Following nearly fourteen years of preaching at the Arborg church, Stefan Jonasson was ordained to
the Unitarian Universalist ministry by the congregation on June 15, 1997. In addition to his work with
the Arborg church, Stefan served as the Unitarian Universalist Association's District Consultant for
Western Canada from 1991 until 2002. Since 1999, he has been the UUA's Coordinator of Services for
Large Congregations, while continuing to serve as minister in Arborg. Sylvia Sigurdson and Russ
McMillan were installed as lay chaplains in 1997 to offer rites of passage throughout the Interlake
region.

In the fall of 2003, the Arborg Unitarian Church marked its eightieth anniversary as a beacon of liberal
religion in the Manitoba Interlake, reminding us all of the significance of the Icelandic people in the
history of Canadian Unitarianism.

The Gimli Unitarian Church

From Gimli Saga (1967) based on information from
The Icelandic people in Manitoba by Wilhelm Kristjanson.

The main tenets of the Unitarian movement contain a revolt against the teaching of eternal damnation
and worship of Christ as God in the Trinity. They choose to believe in the Unity of God, and to follow
the humanitarian and ethical teachings of Christ as a supreme example of the ideal way of life. They
reject the necessity for any of their members to be compelled to follow a creed.

The founder of the Unitarian movement among Icelandic communities in America was Björn Pétursson.
He had migrated to Sandy Bar in 1876, but moved to North Dakota in 1879. When the Icelandic
Lutheran Synod was formed in 1885, he attended, but found it too conservative for his liking, so he
undertook to form an independent liberal religious organization. Services were held in Winnipeg in 1890,
the first Unitarian congregation west of Toronto. A similar movement was taking place in New Iceland,
led by the Rev. Magnús J. Skaptason, who preached a sermon on Easter Sunday, 1891, repudiating the
teachings of the Lutheran church, which led to the second religious cleavage in New Iceland. A crucial
meeting was held at Gimli March 31, 1891, when four congregations seceded from the Lutheran Synod.
In 1901, a Unitarian Association was formed at a meeting held at Gimli with eight localities, Winnipeg,
Gimli, Ames, Hnausa, Big Island, and Lundar, represented. Opinion was divided as to the name, but in
1903 it was named the "Icelandic Unitarian Association."

The Rev. Jóhann P. Sólmundsson, a Gimli school teacher who had graduated from Meadville Theological
Seminary, was called, and served the congregation from 1903 to 1910 in the new church which was
built on Second Avenue in 1905, and dedicated October 29, 1905, a simple white frame building with a
tall spire, and with a balcony and a high choir loft inside. It still stands, in good condition, but unused,
in 1974.

Of Solmundsson, Wilhelm Kristjanson writes: "Solmundsson was intellectually gifted, an able, dramatic,
and fiery speaker. He was interested in social reform. However, he was unsparing in controversy, which
was a handicap in his field of work, and he withdrew from the ministry soon after 1910". While in Gimli,
he also was editor of more than one Icelandic paper published here, including Baldur.

The Rev. Albert E. Kristjánsson, who was born in Iceland and came to Gimli with his parents in 1887,
also taught school before graduating from Meadville. He served the Gimli congregation from 1910 to
1913, and ministered in the little Icelandic settlements in the central and western Interlake, Mary Hill,
Otto, Hove, and Oak Point, before moving to the west coast in 1928. In 1974, he still lives at
Vancouver, Washington, in a senior citizens' home, with a still active and alert mentality.

The Rev. Eyjólfur J. Melan of Riverton served the Gimli congregation for many years. He ministered here
from 1922-1926, then moved away to California for several years, during which period the Rev. Thórgeir
Jonsson was Unitarian minister at Gimli, from 1927-1930. When Melan returned to this area in 1933, he
again became the Unitarian minister, continuing to hold services until his retirement in 1952. The Rev.
P. M. Petursson was then the only Unitarian minister left in Manitoba, and he came to Gimli periodically
to conduct services.

In 1920 a union was affected in Winnipeg between the Tabernacle Church, an Icelandic congregation
which had split away from the Lutheran Synod owing to divergent views, and the Unitarian Church. The
merged church was named First Federated Church, and the Gimli congregation also adopted the name
of Federated Church, which continued until about 1950, when the name Unitarian Church was resumed.

During almost 50 years the little congregation at Gimli operated an active Sunday School, even during
years when there was no pastor. Finally, however, lack of pupils caused it to be dropped.
During one or two summers in the 1950s a mission student pastor from Boston came during the summer
months to hold regular services. Since then services at the church have been rare, except for the
occasional funeral, when the Rev. P. M. Petursson was called out to officiate.

A valuable community service was rendered in Gimli for many years by this congregation, in the
operation of their Parish Hall, which was built in 1924. The Rev. E. J. Melan was the architect, and also
directed the building of it.

For many years it was the only community hall in the district. Countless dances for young and old were
held there, political meetings, annual school concerts, wedding parties, and gatherings of every kind. It
became a temporary hospital in the thirties when the Gimli Women's Institute held its tonsil clinic, and
again years later when the Red Cross held its first Blood Donor Clinics. It served as a movie theatre
when Harry Greenberg started showing movies there. Truly it can be said to have been a centre of
community life in Gimli for more than a quarter of a century.

With the coming of sewer and water and modern standards for public halls, and the decline of the
popularity of dances and concerts, the Unitarian congregation decided to sell the Parish Hall rather
than try to finance its updating. When it was sold and moved away by the buyers, the Arnason family,
in 1960, to be used for the building of summer cottages on Willow Island, there was much regret
expressed by Gimli citizens, who realized fully then what a contribution it had made. The Town of Gimli
is still without a community hail in 1974, though there is a large school auditorium which can fill some of
the needs, but not all.

The Unitarians have provided other contributions. Their Ladies' Aid worked hard for many years,
supporting community projects as well as their church. The sale of Icelandic baking they held each
summer was a highlight of the Icelandic Festival weekend. Church periodicals were published.

During the depression years, the Western Canada Alliance of Unitarian Women, with which the Unitarian
Ladies' Aid of Gimli, is affiliated, were very concerned about the needy Icelandic children in Winnipeg,
who had no opportunity to get out into the country. In 1932 plans were made to billet children on
farms in the Interlake area. This led, in 1935, to renting a summer cottage at Gimli, to which various
groups of children were transported by cars and looked after for a week each, entirely free of charge.
That first summer 100 children enjoyed a wonderful holiday.

At the same time money was being raised by the women, led by Mrs. S. Björnson, wife of Dr. Björnson
of Arborg. The plan was to build a permanent summer camp. Much of the fund was obtained by means
of a Blómasjoð (Flower Fund), to which individuals and organizations made bequests or donations.
Sveinn Thorvaldsson of Riverton and Ketill Valgardson of Gimli each left $500.00 to this cause, to name
but two of the donors.

The site chosen was just south of Hnausa, a beautiful, well-treed spot on the shore of Lake Winnipeg.
The camp buildings were erected in 1937 under the direction of Rev. Eyjólfur Melan, who did the
greater part of the work without remuneration. Money was not plentiful, but the need and the will to
complete this worthy project were great. The women made wool-filled comforters, and furnished the
main building. The Hnausa Camp flourished for ten years, the women of the Alliance voluntarily giving
their services to look after it. At one time the shoreline moved inland due to high water, making it
necessary to move the buildings farther away from the shore.

When the need to help these children became less urgent and the Alliance could no longer operate the
camp due to strict regulations requiring a Registered Nurse to be in residence, as well as better
sanitary facilities, with which they were unable to comply, it was necessary to find a new use for the
camp. For several years it was loaned rent-free to numerous groups such as the Association of
Retarded Children, Girl Guides, etc., who themselves assumed responsibility for the requirements. In
recent years the Hnausa Camp has been utilized by families or groups of young people from the church.
Certain it is that the Hnausa Fresh Air Camp brightened the lives of many children in a time of great
need.

Postscript

Thirty-eight years have passed since the story of the Gimli Unitarian Church appeared in Gimli Saga, a
history of the town and surrounding municipality that was published by the Gimli Women's Institute to
mark Canada's centennial.

In 1994, the Arborg congregation sponsored the re-opening of the historic Gimli Unitarian Church, about
25 miles away. The Gimli congregation was down to two voting members when the first Unitarian
service since 1981 was held there. (The church had, in fact, become inactive by 1967.) Reorganized as
a summer congregation in this popular resort community, the church now draws an average of 35-40
people to its services. Stefan Jonasson preached at the first service and has continued to anchor the
summer program since then. Within a year of re-opening, the congregation undertook a complete
restoration of the building, which was built and dedicated in 1905. Western Canada District presented
the Gimli Heritage Committee with the Jennie McCaine Peterson Award for its work in restoring the
church. In addition to serving the needs of Gimli's Unitarians, the restored facility is home to the Gimli
Theatre Association and is being used increasingly for concerts and other public events.