Hobson headed church pensions

Archdeacon George Ernest “Ernie” Hobson, former director of pensions of the Anglican Church of Canada, died in a Toronto hospital on Oct. 30 at the age of 86.

Mr. Hobson became pensions director in November 1971 and retired in December 1986.

In 1980 he was elected vice-president of the Church Pension Conference – a group of 41 pension plans – and became its president a year later in 1981, the first Canadian to hold that office.

Born in Regina, Mr. Hobson was ordained in 1962. He worked as an assistant at Toronto’s Church of the Transfiguration from 1962-1964 and was later appointed rector of St. Paul’s, Uxbridge, Ont. In 1969 he was appointed executive secretary of the diocese of Qu’Appelle.

Mr. Hobson was active in the life of General Synod, serving as a member of the National Executive Committee (predecessor to the Council of General Synod).

In 1941, while in Regina, he joined the army and served in the Royal Canadian Corps of Signals attached to a medium artillery regiment; he saw action in France, Belgium, Great Britain, the Netherlands and Germany. He later became active with the Royal Canadian Legion and the Saskatchewan Association on Human Rights, where he served as its first president. He was a member of the Canadian Human Rights Committee which organized the Human Rights Conferences in 1967 and 1968.

Mr. Hobson is survived by his wife Edna (“Ted”), a son, a daughter and a grandson.