With the beginning of Holy Week and Easter Sunday, the holiest day on the Christian calendar,  Al Akehurst graciously took time from his busy schedule to talk with me about becoming a priest at a time of life when most people are settling into more leisurely pursuits. Not many would make a transition from a career in human resources and labour relations to the priesthood when they retired, but Akehurst fulfilled a long term goal when he left his work with School District 23 and did just that. “For me, it’s been a blessing”, he said. “My only regret is that I didn’t do it twenty years earlier.” On second thought, he added “But twenty years ago I probably wasn’t ready.”
When Akehurst retired in 2002, at age 60, he was spiritually ready. He is, in his words, “a cradle Anglican” and had been very active in the church as a teen when he was an altar server. When he attended university, where he majored in “beer and bridge”, he drifted away. Incidentally, he also majored in history and political science and earned a General Arts degree at the University of British Columbia.
His life followed a relatively common path: marriage, two children, and a position with the federal government that further led him into labour relations and labour law. He completed a masters’ degree program at Carleton University while working in Ottawa.
Because Al grew up in Port Alberni, a union town, and his Dad had been active in the union, union matters were familiar territory for him. His experience and education eventually led him to Kelowna and a position with School District 23 as Director of Human Resources, specializing in labour relations work.
Al returned to the religion in which he’d been raised after a Marriage Encounter week-end, sponsored by the Anglican Church, that he attended with his wife Jacqueline in 1982. These encounters are still offered today. The focus of the encounter is to help couples strengthen their marriage. The church’s aim is to bring the men back to church. It worked with Akehurst and he “went back with a vengeance.” The couple adopted the Marriage Encounter view that a marriage is a three way relationship; it has to include God. His marriage and the relationship he’d had with his church was renewed and strengthened. He originally sought to become a deacon, an ordained position within the Anglican system, but ultimately felt called to become a priest.
Following a meeting with the bishop and assurance that he would be accepted as a priest, Akehurst altered his life style and returned to school once more, with Jacqueline’s blessing. Following two years of seminary training in Vancouver, he was ordained as a deacon on May 1, 2004 and as a priest on September 29, 2004, the Feast of St Michael’s Day, in the Cathedral Church of St. Michael and All Angels in Kelowna.
The Akehursts enjoyed two summers at Barkerville, a common training ground for Anglican priests. There Al conducted services in the historical St. Saviour’s Anglican Church, a role for which he adopted the persona of the founding priest, the Reverend James Reynard (1829-1875). Reynard designed and almost single-handedly built the church using locally grown whip-sawn pine in 1869. It has functioned ever since and is now one of the oldest buildings in B.C. Following that delightful experience, he worked as an interim priest for about twenty months and also served as a priest assistant part time in the Cathedral. He is now the incumbent at St. Mary’s East Kelowna and says “I am where I’m supposed to be.”
For links to Marriage Encounter web sites – www.reststop.com Donna Duke, Act III |
