"The Heavens Have Become a Highway" The Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada Northland Mission and the Indigenous Principle

Through the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, Pentecostalism became one of the fastest growing religious groupings among Canada’s Indigenous people. Canada’s largest Pentecostal denomination is the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada (PAOC). Founded in 1919, by the mid-to-late twentieth century, the PAOC evangelized Indigenous communities. The Northland Mission (NLM), founded in 1943, became one of the PAOC’s most prominent departments doing so. Based within regions adjacent to James and Hudson’s Bays in Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, and to a lesser extent the Northwest Territories, the mission evolved from a eurocentric evangelistic organization to an aviation ministry tailored to an Indigenous audience. By 1960 the NLM evangelized among the Cree, Oji-Cree, and Ojibway territories of Northcentral Canada. Throughout the thirty-three years following its establishment, the NLM existed as the brainchild of its missionary pilot founder, John Spillenaar. In 1955 Spillenaar founded a Bible school to train Indigenous Pentecostal evangelists. Spillenaar’s preference for itinerating meant that the NLM remained dependent upon his leadership and aviation skills. Following his resignation, the PAOC replaced Spillenaar with directors Dale Cummins in 1976 and Ian Winter in 1981. Winter remained director until the NLM’s 1996 dissolution, from which the denomination formed Aboriginal Pentecostal Ministries (APM). The PAOC articulated a missiological practice called the “indigenous principle” and described the NLM as an organization designed to meet the needs of its Indigenous members. In reality the NLM remained thoroughly Euro-Canadian. PAOC leadership also presented the NLM as a mission to be taken over and run by Indigenous ministry leaders. This did not take place until more than fifty years after its founding. When PAOC leadership finally released the NLM to Indigenous leaders, it was only after resources were nearly exhausted, and when popular sentiment no longer supported a Euro-Canadian-run ministry. Despite a history of denominational mismanagement, Indigenous ministers redeveloped and grew APM to twenty-seven churches by 2010. Further, these Indigenous figures established their rightful place at the table of leadership, identifying as both Indigenous and Pentecostal. This thesis examines extensive archival sources; critiques the PAOC’s missionary methods; and provides insight into a heretofore little-known chapter in Canadian religious history.

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