One of Canada’s best known religious leaders, Elder Henry Feyerabend, Speaker Emeritus of the weekly telecasts It Is Written, and Esta Escrito lost his six-year battle with cancer around 5:00 p.m. on Tuesday, December 12, 2006.
Elder Feyerabend started the telecast Destiny in English which ran for 20 years until it was merged with It Is Written Canada where he continued as speaker director in Canada through 2000. In 1972 he launched Esta Escrito in Portuguese that continues to be aired on OMNI TV cable 4 in Toronto.
Elder Feyerabend has written and produced more than 850 episodes for television in both English and Portuguese. By satellite he has shared the gospel with throngs numbering close to half a million on a single night.
Like the well-known Canadian athlete, Terry Fox, Feyerabend succumbed to sarcoma located in his left leg at almost the precise location Fox experienced. And like Fox, Feyerabend was in the race to the end to try to find a cure.
After their amputation both men used the profession they knew best to try to help others. Fox didn’t complete his trans-Canada run on one leg but he achieved his objective of raising millions of dollars to help research a cure. And his influence lives on.
Elder Feyerabend didn’t complete his latest of more than 40 books but his courage and joy in the face of pain and loss has inspired millions to look toward the ultimate cure with hope. In the two-years since his amputation he has published four books. His fifth will be published posthumously.
An example of his courage and stamina were especially evident following his amputation. The day after Elder Feyerabend’s release from the hospital in Toronto he flew to Calgary to preach. Though he has great appreciation for science and medicine there was never a doubt in his mind that the real solution to the tragedy of cancer, pollution, crime and war will come in the return of Jesus Christ to this earth.
Elder Feyerabend is survived by his wife of 53 years, Emma (Martin) Feyerabend, originally of Regina, Sask, one daughter, Judy Feyerabend, of Elliot Lake, ON.
The family requests that in lieu of flowers donations be sent to the It Is Written Ministry, P. O. Box 2010, Oshawa, ON L1H 7V4
Elder Feyerabend’s ministry included 11 years mission service in Brazil where in 1962 he organized and sang first tenor in the Arautos do Rei (The King’s Heralds) male quartet heard across Brazil on the nation’s number one religious broadcast at the time, Voz da Profocia (The Voice of Prophecy).
From childhood Elder Feyerabend’s interests included technology, music and preaching. He built his first radio crystal set while still in elementary school in Waldheim, Sask. He wired and created his first professional audio recording studio in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil while serving as the music director for the radio ministry. Later he created TV studios in Toronto and London, Ontario.
Technology for Elder Feyerabend was always a means to an end. The purpose was to let others know the good news of God’s love as seen in the life and person of Jesus Christ.
Memorial services will be held in two places: - On Sunday, Dec.17, 2006 at 2 p.m. (E.T.) at the College Park Seventh-day Adventist Church, 1164 King Street East, Oshawa, Ontario.
- Also on Tuesday, Dec.19, 2006 at The Zoar Mennonite Church, 4009 Second Ave. E., Waldheim, Saskatchewan.
Elder Feyerabend will be interred in the family plot in the Waldheim Cemetery near his childhood home.
Norhtcott Elliott Funeral Home, of Bowmanville, ON is handling the arrangements in Oshawa and Funks Funeral Home, Rosthern SK, will care for the service in Waldheim.