The ‘Between‐Age’ Christianity of Agnes Machar

Abstract

QUEEN'S QUARTERLY WAS ONE OF THE FEW JOURNALS tO mark the passing in 1927 of one of Canada's oldest and most colourful literary figures, Agnes Maule Machar. The author of its tribute correctly noted the importance of a strong Christian faith in all aspects of Machar's life and writing, but he succumbed to presentism when he described her religious views in terms of a strict orthodoxy that had made no provision for the critical thought of the age.' Such a perspective ignored the fact that in the last quarter of the nineteenth century Machat had been in the forefront of those lay Canadians attempting to shape a revitalized Christianity in the face of contemporary challenges to belief. Like the clerics and educators of A.B. McKillop's A Disciplined Intelligence, 2 Machar was deeply concerned with the questions that science and industrialism posed for Christian ethics and the Christian world view. But as a lay writer of broad culture and diverse talents she was free to deal with those questions in a more eclectic and accessible fashion than could her professional counterparts. As a poet and essayist, a writer of juvenile and adult fiction, and a contributor to major periodicals in Canada, the United States, and Britain, she sought for almost half a century to convey to a variety of audiences the essential features of her religious outlook. Roland Graeme: Knight, a