The Salvation Army in Corner Brook has a special guest visiting this week. Commissioner Christine MacMillan, became an officer with the Army in 1975 and today she has a title that is the second highest rank. MacMillan has lived in five countries as an officer. She joined Lenny on “The Morning Tide” on Bayfm and talked about her time in Papua, New Guinea. She was the first female leader in that country and the men there were respectful of women when she left.
MacMillan says her journey with the Army started here in NL. Her grandparents were Salvation Army officers and at 13 she came to Corner Brook to be with “Grandpa Lodge.” She says he was retired but would get calls at all hours of the day from the RCMP when someone was disturbed or had a need for comfort.
MacMillan was recently appointed as one of three Global Envoys in the world with UNICEF. During a speech in September at the United Nations General Assembly, she scrapped her intro after gauging the temperature of the room. She felt sadness and anger from those attending because last year, for the first time in a while, the number of preventable deaths were increasing according to UNICEF. These deaths are children dying from hunger, health related issues and even climate change. The numbers had dropped from 10.5 million to 4.5 million. MacMillan says if the world doesn’t change, by 2030, those deaths will be around 27.5 million. She says things like war cost a lot of money and that only ends with peace and reconciliation.
