Union started earlier

Congratulations on Insights special edition celebrating UCA’s 40th birthday.

It was good to read the reflections from so many different people. However, no-one really looked back before the vote, to see the coming-together as part of a very long process which began with Federation.

In 1902, my grandfather, the Rev Walter Cunliffe-Jones was the Congregational representative on a committee which met to consider the formation of an Australian Protestant Church! It was 75 years before the Uniting Church came into being and then only three denominations were involved. More recently, in 1967, I was part of a team in the Hurstville area which visited Congregational, Methodist and Presbyterian congregations to inform them about the proposed union.

There were many such teams, each with lay and clergy representatives from each denomination. I think this was done under the auspices of the Joint Board of Christian Education.

Joan Wilcox, Epping Uniting Church.