The Rev. Dr. Harold Munn

The Rev. Dr. Harold Munn taught science to African high school students in Malawi, East Africa for three years after completing a degree at UVic in Classics, and as many science courses as he could get away with. Then, having no idea what to do with the rest of his life, he investigated the attractive proposal that God had died out of love for humanity, because if true, it would transform the world. He enrolled at Trinity College in Toronto, not to prepare for ordination, but to test this extraordinary claim. He found no certainty for the existence of God and lost his faith, regaining it in the subsequent pain which connected him with the crucified Christ.

Harold was ordained in the Yukon in 1973 where he served for seven years, then in a suburban parish in Edmonton for another seven, and then as Dean at All Saints Cathedral, Edmonton, for eleven years. He then returned to his birth city of Victoria where he was appointed rector of St. John the Divine where he served for thirteen years, heavily involved in the arts and street issues. In retirement, Harold was appointed Director of Anglican Formation at the Vancouver School of Theology for three years after which he did interim ministries with congregations in transition for another half-dozen years in and around Vancouver.

He continues to be honoured to preside and preach in parishes when needed. Harold has been active in social justice issues with oppressed communities in inner cities, visits inmates serving long sentences in prisons up the Valley, has been active in climate demonstrations, is an Associate of the international Society of Ordained Scientists, has authored two books, one on discovering God at the centre of secularism and science ("Faith in Doubt - how my dog made me an atheist..."), and one on the gift of joy we could experience in the midst of the climate crisis ("Faith in Disaster - finding joy in the climate collapse..."). He writes a daily commentary on the daily lectionary, available online. Harold loves tinkering with anything mechanical or electronic. Harold and Claire (the first head nurse of Canada's first transplant unit) have been married half a century, which went by in a flash, and they have two adult children, one a priest and one a paramedic firefighter, and four grandchildren.