The Primate's World Relief and Development Fund: Stories

Launch of 50th Anniversary Program September 4, 2008

PWRDF

October 2008

The Primate's World Relief and Development Fund (PWRDF) is a good news story for the Anglican Church of Canada (ACC). Since 1958 Anglicans in Canada have raised more than $88 million to support PWRDF’s work, believing that we can all share in the creation of a more just and peaceful world.  

Our 50th anniversary program, launching in October 2008 and continuing until General Synod in June 2010, is an exciting time that will focus on celebration, awareness, fundraising and education. An important initiative will be facilitating the sponsorships of fifty refugee families for resettlement to Canada under Canada’s unique Private Sponsorship of Refugees Program. Since 1979 Anglican dioceses have changed the lives of many refugees through private sponsorship.

The Primate’s World Relief Fund (as it was first named) came into existence as a result of the Springhill Mine Disaster of 1958. On October 23rd of that year, in Springhill, Nova Scotia, an underground explosion trapped 174 men in a coal mine at a depth of 14,000 feet. 75 men died as a result of the disaster. The tragedy moved Anglicans and other Canadians to respond with assistance for the stricken families and community. As a result of this experience the church recognized the need for an efficient process to direct assistance quickly in emergency situations. Within its first decade of existence the word “Development” was added to the name as PWRDF came to see that deeper, long-term development needs were strongly connected to most of the suffering caused by natural or human disasters around the world and that the people who experienced these problems first-hand were in the best position to develop long-term solutions.

Today, with the support of Anglican parishes across Canada, PWRDF makes financial and human resources available to support partners' initiatives and to promote knowledgeable actions of solidarity at home and around the world. PWRDF addresses the issues Canadians care about: HIV and AIDS, emergency relief, sustainable development, global justice, climate change, food security and food justice.  PWRDF offers focused, effective partnership as an expression of our baptismal covenant to strive for justice and peace and to respect the dignity of every human being.

As we reflect on and celebrate the accomplishments of our first fifty years we also look to the future, to bring new inspiration to a world in crisis in a uniquely Canadian Anglican way. Fifty years after the Springhill disaster we are asking Anglicans across Canada to continue to make a difference by joining us, working together, and helping to inspire the next fifty years of changing lives, changing communities, and changing the world.

For further information please contact: Carolyn Vanderlip, 50th Anniversary Program Facilitator: 416-924-9199 ext 266 or cvanderlip[at]pwrdf.org.

The Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund is the Anglican Church of Canada’s agency for sustainable development, relief, refugees and global justice.