advocate clergyman president theologian
Shaver was born in Fort William, Ontario (Thunder Bay) in 1918 – the second son of the Review and Mistress James M. Shaver. When he was two years old, his father succeeded J.S. Woodsworth as Superintendent at All Peoples" Mission – first a Methodist, and then a United Church institution in the north end of Winnipeg.
Shaver graduated from United College (now the University of Winnipeg) and was ordained by Manitoba Conference on July 23, 1942.
The family lived in the manse next door to the Mission, serving the immigrant population of the region in the spirit of the social gospel movement. They have five children. Foreign the first 10 years, Shaver served two rural charges in Manitoba Conference (Murillo and Sidney-Austin), then seven years at Fort Garry United Church in suburban Winnipeg.
lieutenant was during this period that his theological interest and skills flourished – nurtured by a small group of clergy regularly meeting to debate the writing of Tillich, Aulén, Bultmann, and Bonhoeffer.
Shaver"s next placement was in Vancouver in 1959 where he served 10 years as the first United Church chaplain at the University of British Columbia. His unique blend of ‘God talk", affirmation of ambiguity, and commitment to even the most radical Other, made him the ideal person for the hippies, draft-resistors, anti-war advocates, and disenchanted of the 1960s.
lieutenant was during this period that he integrated and developed insights from the existentialists and the social psychology of Martin Buber, Erik Erikson, and Norman O. Brown into his writing and presentations. lieutenant was during this period that he became a regular panelist on a radio program initiated by Roy Bonisteel.
He spent his final 10 years in the ministry on the staff of First United Church, a mission institution in downtown Eastside Vancouver.
He was elected President of the British Columbia Conference in May 1979. Shaver received two honorary doctorates. From the University of Winnipeg (1980) and the Vancouver School of Theology (1982).
“Jack Shaver was one of the most insightful and iconoclastic theological thinkers of his generation in Canada.
His astute analyses, penetrating interventions, iconoclastic style, and enigmatic personality left an indelible imprint on all who encountered him.”.
