Vestry resigns en masse to protest lack of response
A fired dean and rector at the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in Corner Brook, Nfld. says she has filed a complaint with the ecclesiastical province of Canada alleging that Bishop of Western Newfoundland John Organ violated the province’s Safe Church Charter after, among other things, revoking her license to practice ministry.
Organ announced the firing of the Very Rev. Catherine Short, who had served as dean and rector since 2018, in a speech at a live-streamed Sunday worship service Jan. 19. Short filed her claim with the ecclesiastical province March 3. If all avenues through the church are exhausted, Short says, her only subsequent recourse will be legal action through civil authorities.
St. John the Evangelist parishioners have called for the reinstatement of Short and Organ’s resignation. Many have attended multiple peaceful protests outside the cathedral. All nine members of the vestry resigned after Organ did not respond to their repeated requests for a meeting.
In his speech, Organ described numerous personal conflicts with Short. He said clashes between him and Short began shortly after she started as rector and claimed these had led to her making “angry and threatening social media posts.” Organ said Short had served the parish well, but had also exhibited anger—to the point where he felt uncomfortable going to her office—and a “passive-aggressive leadership style.” He said he would reverse the cancellation of Short’s license and welcome her back as dean if she agreed to anger management training and worked within the church’s conflict resolution model.
Longtime congregation member Glynda Seaborn said Organ’s speech announcing Short’s firing shocked her. She found Organ’s claim that Short exhibited anger management issues implausible.
“I found it hard to believe that anger issues were such a common part of her ministry when none had been evident to me,” Seaborn says.
Deborah Howe, until recently a vestry member, says she was upset and surprised by the manner in which Organ delivered the news to the congregation, using the time allotted for the homily instead of making an announcement at the beginning or end of the service.
“I couldn’t believe it—that he would get up and not address the scriptures at all, and his time for the sermon was strictly used for explaining or not explaining really what was going on,” Howe says.
Some parishioners walked out during Organ’s speech. After the service, vestry members emailed the bishop several times asking for a congregational meeting, at one point offering to bring in an outside meditator for the discussion.
“He didn’t respond to us at all,” Howe says. “That was very frustrating… We just wanted some answers.” After Organ ignored their repeated requests for a meeting, the vestry left a letter telling the bishop they felt he should resign.
Organ subsequently hired retired archdeacon the Ven. David Taylor as interim rector. Some parishioners like Seaborn and Howe have refused to attend services at St. John the Evangelist and are worshipping at other local Anglican churches.
When Organ finally contacted the vestry, Howe says, it was to inform them that they could not meet without a rector and that the letter they sent him therefore had no validity. Vestry members debated whether to wait until Organ’s planned retirement in summer 2026.
“We decided that if we wanted to take action, and we did, we weren’t going to let this go,” Howe says. “We heard one too many people say, ‘Oh, the bishop will be retired in a year and a half. Let’s just ride it out.’ And we thought, that’s not good enough.”
Vestry members also sent emails to Archbishop David Edwards, metropolitan of the ecclesiastical province of Canada, and every other bishop across the country, Howe says, yet received no response. Finally, the vestry resigned en masse in protest on Feb. 14.
Organ and Edwards declined comment for this article. The CBC contacted the Anglican Church of Canada and received an email response that church leaders were aware of the situation in the diocese of Western Newfoundland, but that neither Edwards as metropolitan or Anne Germond as acting primate had any jurisdiction in the matters at issue, though they could offer pastoral care and support.
“That’s not what we needed,” Howe says. “No, we had bigger issues. But nobody apparently was going to touch this untouchable bishop because he had absolute power and there was nothing to be done. It would appear he is not accountable to anybody.”
Parishioners including Howe and Seaborn have organized repeated protests outside the cathedral on Sundays, calling for Short to be reinstated and for Organ to resign. Approximately 50 people attended a protest on Feb. 26, carrying signs with messages that included “We support Reverend Short”, “We were a very happy congregation”, “Discipleship not distress and destruction” and “Bishop Organ resign!”
Before her firing, Howe says, “Dean Catherine was doing wonderful things,” including running the Open Door outreach ministry, a free lunch program offered every Monday at cathedral; leading Bible study groups and preparing the cathedral’s first Sunday school classes since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
‘I’ve never been accused of being an angry person’
Short told the Anglican Journal that the spark for her firing occurred at a Jan. 14 meeting with Organ and the vestry to discuss the Safe Church Charter, which the diocesan synod had adopted in September. Organ had contacted her on Dec. 30 to say there were some serious issues that needed to be addressed at the cathedral and he would like to meet with vestry.
“There were no issues that any of us were aware of … When a few of the vestry members questioned him, his whole demeanour changed,” Short says. “He sat up straighter in his chair and got defensive and just kept repeating that there’s a toxic environment at the cathedral.”
At the start of the meeting, Short recalls, Organ said anyone who felt triggered by the topics under discussion could feel free to leave. For Short, the meeting triggered memories of conflict with Organ during a 15-month battle she had fought with cancer, she says.
Remembering that episode while Organ discussed the Safe Church Charter and said Short was creating a toxic work environment, Short says, she chose to leave the room. She subsequently received a notice from the bishop revoking her license to officiate, which she says left her stunned.
“I thought I knew this bishop and how he operates very well, but even I didn’t expect that,” Short says, adding, “I wrote back fairly quickly, probably within minutes and said to the bishop, ‘Well, that’s quite rash.’ Then he said, ‘Well, there’s your anger showing.’”
“I’ve never been accused of being an angry person,” Short says. “Everybody who I’ve worked with is really taken aback by that.” As a priest, she often visited people’s homes for home communion. If Organ was allegedly afraid to come into her office, she says, “Why was I permitted to go into people’s homes? It just doesn’t make any sense.”
Her relationship with Organ has never been easy, Short adds. “I worked closer most than most priests did with the bishop, that’s for sure. Every couple of months, something would happen, he’d be displeased.” Organ made the threat of a lawsuit to her twice, Howe says—once on the phone and once in the presence of others.
Along with Organ’s resignation and reinstating Short, Howe would like to see a response from the national church “to indicate that they’re at least going to look into this issue of accountability of the bishops in this matter and other matters.”
In response to a March 6 email from the Anglican Journal asking what recourse parishioners have if they feel their bishop has acted inappropriately, Henrieta Paukov, communications director for the Anglican Church of Canada, sent a statement from the church that the acting primate “has no jurisdiction in the matters at issue” but is available to provide pastoral care and support.
“Any non-criminal allegation of misconduct by a diocesan bishop is dealt with first under the canons of the bishop’s diocese,” the statement read. “Appeals from those processes generally go to the archbishop.” Canon XVIII of the General Synod governs disciplinary matters within the Anglican Church of Canada by laying out the framework for all diocesan discipline canons.
Organ has served as bishop of Western Newfoundland since 2018.
Note: This article has been updated from an earlier version of this story that incorrectly attributed the statement from the Anglican Church of Canada to Henrieta Paukov, and misattributed some statements made in John Organ’s speech.
