Ralph Horner

1853-1921. Founder of the Holiness Movement Church in Canada. Born in Shawville, Quebec, he was converted at a Methodist meeting in 1876 and began almost immediately to preach to his neighbors. Realizing he had the ability to elicit strong emotional responses from his hearers, he decided to enter the Methodist ministry. He attended Victoria College (1883-85), during which time he continued to organize holiness meetings. Refusing a regular circuit in 1886, he embarked on an independent evangelistic tent ministry. Because of mounting protests against the speaking in tongues which accompanied his preaching, the Montreal Annual Conference deposed him from its ministry in 1895. He organized his followers into a Holiness Movement Church, and in 1895 at a convention in Ottawa attended by evangelists from Ontario, the Western Provinces, and Quebec, he was elected bishop. He held this position until he withdrew from the Holiness Movement Church in 1916 over the true interpretation of sanctification and formed the Standard Church of America. After his death both churches declined rapidly.