Malcolm Archibald Caldwell (1926-2012)

The death on Thursday, 1 March, of Malcolm Caldwell draws to an end a remarkable career in the Presbyterian Church in Canada. I had the privilege of attending the funeral service at St Paul’s Presbyterian Church in Ottawa when about 150 of us joined in celebrating his life and witness in worship led by the Clerk of Presbytery, James Hurd, who was a successor of Malcolm’s in Woodstock, New Brunswick. The message was delivered by Rev Clarence H. Witten, minister of the Dixon’s Corners Christian Reformed Church. The Caldwells, when they retired from ministry, had moved to Lantz, Nova Scotia and worshipped at the church Clarence Witten had pastored at the time,  Faith Community, in Milford. Their minister at St Paul’s, Jack Archibald, was out of town conducting chaplaincy retreats at Lake Louise, Alberta.

On 30 August 2008 as  Convener of the Committee on History, PCC, I interviewed Malcolm for its Oral History project. He and Lois had recently moved into Ottawa from their second retirement home in Merrickville. With Lois’ help, he struggled to recall events in his twenty-three year ministry in the Presbyterian Church in Canada.

That ministry had been nurtured in his home congregation of St Andrew’s Sydney Mines. Malcolm was born a year after church union when the church, by a vote of 265-59, remained in the Presbyterian Church in Canada. The minister at the time was F Scott MacKenzie, from 1927 to 1945 Principal and subsequently (to 1958) Professor at Presbyterian College, Montreal. As I say in my biography of Stanford Reid (pages 103-6), MacKenzie very much identified with the old liberalism. It was the induction of Quincy McDowell in 1930, an American, a graduate (with my father) of the Princeton Seminary class of 1927 , that shaped both St Andrew’s and the Caldwell family. Malcolm’s younger brother was named Quincy so profound was their pastor’s impact. McDowell, who remained for a decade, was followed (from 1940-1952) by another American, Clarke Evans, a 1935 graduate of Westminster Seminary.

It was during the ministry of Doug Wilson in St Andrew’s (1954-1962) that Malcolm felt the stirrings of a call to ministry.  He was at the time an employee of Dominion Steel and Coal in Sydney where he had worked since high school. His brother Quincy had taken theological studies at Westminster Seminary graduating in 1959. Now, three years later Malcolm, with his wife Lois (née MacQueen), and two children set off for Boston and studies at Gordon College and Divinity School. In this move he was encouraged by H Stewart Gray, a 42 year Trustee of Gordon Divinity School and an elder of the United Presbyterian Church of Newton, MA, with a cottage on the Mira where he and his wife, Leta (née Shaw), would summer. A successful businessman, Stewart had set up a Trust Fund for fellow Canadians at Gordon.

As Lois, a remarkable woman with great gifts of empathy and efficiency, worked to put Malcolm through school he worked summers at a golf club. He graduated with a BA and subsequently a MDiv, applied for an appointment as an ordained missionary of the PCC and was sent to the Newcastle, New Brunswick, pastoral charge. Joining Miramichi Presbytery in 1968 placed Malcolm at the centre of denominational agitation – and eventual schism – of a group of radical separatists. Unlike brother Quincy. Malcolm was a denominational loyalist, a cool head with mature wisdom and discernment. He moved on to Ottawa, serving in the Gloucester and Vernon charge. Paul Mills had been there before.By now there were three children: Donald, who moved in 1977 to Boston to work with Stewart Gray as an apprentice to his partner Stewart MacDonald, Mary and Malcolm (who later followed his brother to to work for MacGray Co.)

The family returned to the Maritimes as Malcolm accepted a call to St Paul’s Woodstock.  His time at Woodstock was very fruitful: he gathered around him a Session that had been previously nurtured by Bob Ross: a remarkable group of laymen deeply committed and with leadership gifts. I had the privilege of living in the Woodstock Manse the summer of 1981 and can attest to the quality of its life and witness under Malcolm’s leadership. One of the elders, Archie McLean, later President of Maple Leaf Foods, gave me some good advice. The service at St Paul’s was broadcast and, having heard me preach my first Sunday service as he was driving back from conducting a service at the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Houlton, Maine, he was outspoken: “If you preach here in Woodstock as though you were at Knox Church Toronto  you won’t have a congregation very long.” I took that comment as a commendation of Malcolm’s ministry. Warmly pastoral, with an ability to immediately recall individual names, Malcolm was a man of the people:  passionate about his Christian faith and contagious in sharing it.

On 28 June 1984 Malcolm was inducted as Senior Minister of Bethel Church, Sydney. His predecessor, Everett Bean, had been an icon in the PCC and served as Clerk of Synod (and General Assembly) with great distinction. Malcolm was a native son, knew the area well, and was quickly integrated back into the community, enjoying support from Everett Bean who remained in the congregation as minister emeritus until his tragic death on 7 January 1991. Bethel was a post-Union amalgamation of several minorities among Sydney Presbyterian churches and has always represented a challenge to its clergy through its sheer size and diversity. Shortly after Dr Bean’s death Malcolm announced his retirement, as of June 1991. He was 65 years of age.

Many tributes were paid Malcolm but none was appreciated more than the honour granted him by Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in 1990. At the instigation of Stewart Gray, the school conferred on Malcolm the degree of Doctor of Divinity, honoris causa. Stewart beamed with pride as Malcolm came up to receive his diploma. With two of his boys working for MacGray,  ninety-one year old Stewart was the proud honourary parent. Four years later Stewart Gray was gone, with much of his estate going to Gordon-Conwell Seminary.

Malcolm and Lois were together in ministry for fifty-eight years. Twenty-one of those years were spent in retirement. Malcolm was a man of prayer, as his three children bore witness at the funeral. Their passionate profession of personal faith in Christ, given at that service, was a moving witness to the impact of his life. There is a whole generation of pastors of Malcolm’s ilk that are passing on: as we honour them we pay tribute to the leadership they provided in a church that is vastly different today. Malcolm’s faithfulness is an example to all of us. His faithful daily devotional life is a reminder that it is in the little things, the disciplines of the rhythm of our lives, that we will be judged.