David W. Virtue
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Born and raised in Wellington, New Zealand, David attended Scots College a private boys’ school, in Wellington, from which he graduated in 1961. He worked for the Province newspaper as a reporter and later attended Victoria University, where he studied English and Philosophy. He went on to study for a Diploma in Theology at London Bible College. He later moved to the United States, where he undertook further theological studies at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Il, for two years, following which he completed his MCS at Regent College, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC.
David became Religion Editor of the Vancouver Province newspaper where he served for eight years. He moved to New York City in 1979 where he took up a position as Media Communications Director for the American Bible Society. He later accepted the position of Media Communications Director for American Leprosy Missions. He served for two years as associate pastor of an historic Black Baptist Church in Montclair, NJ. He briefly served with World Vision International as Communications Director in Ethiopia. David became a freelance journalist and is the author of three books. His first book, A FLAME FOR JUSTICE, is on the life of Caesar Molebatsi, a visionary black pastor and leader in Soweto, South Africa. His second book, A VISION OF HOPE on the life of Samuel Habib, one of the Arab world’s leading contemporary Christian leaders based in Cairo, Egypt, demonstrated a holistic approach to mission. His third book, written conjointly with the Rev. Dr. Earle Fox, on HOMOSEXUALITY: GOOD AND RIGHT IN THE EYES OF GOD? explores a contemporary culture war issue that currently bedevils the Western Church. For the past 25 years, he has been president and lead writer for VIRTUEONLINE, the Anglican Communion’s largest and most widely read orthodox Anglican Online News Service, which annually reaches over 4 million readers in 170 countries. In 2002, he received an Honorary Doctor of Divinity from Laud Hall Theological Seminary. David lives with his wife Mary in Philadelphia, PA. They have three grown children and three grandchildren. |
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The increasing implosion of the Episcopal Church with its headlong departure from the “faith once delivered” in order to accommodate itself to a secular culture is a heartbreaking experience for one who has loved and served in his Church (in some official capacity since childhood) for some 77 years.
The church's leadership in its doctrinal blindness explains the staggering loss of half of its membership on demographic lines - that the loss of membership is due to society being secular and not a time to be supporting churches. Such pathology cries out for correction and there is no better way to do so than by humor and satire. There are few as knowledgeable and talented to do so as David Virtue. Using C. S. Lewis’ Screwtape Letters as a model he exposes in accurate and telling ways the foibles and self-destruct machinations of the Episcopal Church’s apostasy. |