By Jenny de Groot

(First appeared in the August 2004 issue of The Banner.) 

Six Christian Reformed pastors from British Columbia are pondering how a recent retreat to the tiny Scottish island of Iona will renew them as leaders.

The men had been meeting once a month for peer leadership development and were looking for an alternative retreat experience. “Our study focused on the connection between worship and social justice, and the Iona Community is committed to that very thing,” said Rev. Tom Bomhof of Fleetwood CRC, Surrey. The Sustaining Pastoral Excellence program, funded by a Lilly grant received by the Christian Reformed Church, enabled Bomhof and five other pastors from surrounding churches to experience that community firsthand.
For six days in April the pastors walked an ancient site where Columba founded a Celtic monastery in 563 and to which thousands have made spiritual pilgrimages for centuries. “Iona was a time and place to reflect and catch my breath,” says Rev. Sid Vander Woud of Hope Community CRC, also in Surrey. “But it was also challenging as we were being asked to think about the church’s role in relation to world issues.”

Rev. Henry Numan of First CRC, Vancouver, noted, “Iona is a place to learn anew that a Reformed worldview calls us to peace and justice, as well as to personal and communal responsibility to the world.”

The Iona Community, an ecumenical Christian community “committed to seeking new ways of living the gospel in today's world,” invites its guests to be “transformed through its many dimensions of prayer, worship, acceptance, risk-taking and vision.” For six West Coast pastors, Iona’s offer became an experienced gift.