Leadership Team

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Pearl John 

National Administrator

pearl@canadadisciples.org

Pearl John is our administrator for the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Canada. The national administrator works together with the national pastor while providing whole administrative support to our congregations and ministers across Canada. She is passionate about seeing that the church has solid structures and procedures that will promote the advancement of ministry and that the love of Jesus is spread to the entire world.

Pearl John has a background in managing and leading healthcare and tech projects, but has always worked with not-for-profits to serve humanitarian causes. This has focused on supporting teenagers and youth towards building proper ethical and moral standards while motivating them to walk in their purpose and calling from their early years. She has also pioneered youth projects that provide life skills and self-awareness education that helps teenagers and youths discover themselves and believes that this is most effective from a young age.

Aside from her professional work, Pearl is a singer and songwriter who absolutely loves music. For sports, she'd prefer anything that makes everyone in the room cheer and laugh! She is an optimist who believes; “if we can dream it, we can do it… with God”. Pearl loves working with the churches and having a good time with everyone.

Maddy MacGregor

National Youth Pastor

maddy@canadadisciples.org

Pastor Maddy is our new (and first) national youth pastor in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Canada.

She is called to create new youth and young adult ministry, lead events, provide pastoral care to young people across Canada, and consult with and train local leaders. Maddy has been a leader at church camps from across North America, a congregational youth leader, and an associate university chaplain. Originally from California, Maddy has been in Canada all her adult life. She went to French school as a kid, and has led many bilingual worship services and events during in her time in Québec. Maddy has a bachelor's degree from McGill University in music and psychology, and is now a master of divinity student at Trinity College, University of Toronto.  Maddy has an introductory level in both Mandarin and Arabic — next up, biblical Hebrew!

Rev. Jean-Daniel Ó Donncada  

National Pastor

jean-daniel@canadadisciples.org

Rev. Jean-Daniel Ó Donncada (zhawn-danyell oh dunn uh) is the national pastor for Canada and the represents Canada in the College of Regional Minister for the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in the United States and Canada.

This role supports churches and ministers across Canada and builds relationships with the rest of our denomination in the United States and with other religious communities in Canada.
 

Pastor Jean-Daniel studied at Harvard, Yale, and Université de Montréal. His academic work has focused on how religious communities can best support children, leading to his writings being published in an anthology of essays, Child Honouring, edited by Raffi and with a foreword by the Dalai Lama. He is often a workshop leader and featured speaker on children’s and youth ministry and pastoral care of neurodiverse children across North America. Most recently, he has been an ecumenical chaplain at McGill University and an interfaith hospital chaplain. He has served churches from California to Connecticut to Québec for the last 20 years. Jean-Daniel is particularly passionate about children’s and youth ministry, ecumenical cooperation, and multilingual ministry.
 

Outside of church life, Jean-Daniel is an avid swimmer and photographer who loves musical theatre and Anne of Green Gables far more than most folks believe anyone could. Jean-Daniel grew up in Massachusetts and New Brunswick. He lives in Montréal with his twin daughters, dog, and cats.
 

Pastor Jean-Daniel is excited to visit your churches and meet you all, and explore what God is calling Jesus’ disciples in Canada to do together next.

Rilla Blythe

Canine Assistant to the National Pastor

Bertha Marilla Blythe-Ford, better known as Rilla, is the canine assistant to the national pastor. A service dog who is always with Pastor Jean-Daniel, she also offers her snuggles and hugs with those who request her assistance. Rilla is a border collie, a sheep herding dog by breeding, so well suited to be assistant to a pastor. She is named after the youngest daughter of Anne of Green Gables, the protaganist of Lucy Maud Montgomery's book Rilla of Ingleside. Some descriptions of Rilla that fit both the fictional human and very real dog include:

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• "Wherever Rilla Blythe was, there was laughter."
• "She had great, dreamy, hazel eyes."
• "She had been much petted and was a wee bit spoiled, but still the general opinion was that Rilla Blythe was a very sweet girl."

Professionally, Rilla is an expert on hearing dangers and alarms. In her free time, she loves running, swimming, fetching, and obstacle courses.