Québec is the largest Canadian province (about the size of Alaska) and the only one where French is the population’s first language.  Québec is home to over 7 million people, over 6 million French-speakers, and around 700,000 immigrants.  Its import-export performance makes it one of the world’s top 20 economies. Québec is also 17 highly diverse regions: rural and urban, mountainous and maritime, French-speaking and cosmopolitan.

Economy:

Over the last number of years, Québec has had a strong economic performance. The largest Canadian province, Québec has a gross domestic product (GDP) of more than $265 billion Canadian, 70 % of which comes from the service sector.  The GDP is equivalent to approximately US$205 billion or $EUR165 billion.

Although it is not a country, the province of Québec has an economy whose scope compares with that of  Portugal. Its economy therefore ranks 41st in the world, and 21st in terms of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. Furthermore, Québec's GDP per person, it can be compared to that of Germany and Italy and even surpasses that of Spain.

Culture:

As the only French-speaking society in North America, Québec is deeply attached to its culture. Québec's culture is the very symbol of its identity, joining its French-Catholic roots together with the Amerindian heritage, while being influenced by its proximity to the United States and by the multi-ethnic population that shapes its demographic profile.

Recent Evangelical History:

In 1950 there were only 4 French-speaking Baptist churches in all of Québec, with less than 500 known evangelical believers of any stripe.  Several missionaries from English-speaking Canada came, preached the gospel, began church planting, and were thrown in prison by the Catholic church for a total of seven years (surprised yet?).

In the 1960’s, Quebec experienced what is known as the “Silent Revolution.”  In the early 1960’s, around 95% of French-speaking Quebeckers were practicing Catholics.  Within a dozen years, less than 5% of the French-speaking population was considered to be practicing Catholic (Basically, what took France 200 years to live out took place in one generation in Quebec).

In the 1970’s and early 1980’s the national Baptist church movement, along with the Assembly of God and Mennonite brethren movements, exploded exponentially, then slowed in the mid 80’s until around 2000.  Recently, among the Baptists, a massive church planting movement, in conjunction with a vibrant and growing French seminary, is spilling over into all parts of Quebec.  Their goal is to grow from 75 churches to over 100 by 2010.  However, even with this encouraging movement, of the six million French-speaking Quebeckers, nearly two million live in communities with no evangelical church of any kind.

A Nation Within A Nation:

Percentage of Evangelicals in English-speaking Canada:         13%

Percentage of Evangelicals in French-speaking Canada:        0.56%

This is why I speak of “French-Speaking Quebec” rather than “Canada.”  Simply saying “Canada” gives a false impression of where we work.  Vancouver, BC and Montreal QC are two radically different cultures who speak two different languages, with radically different cultural histories… much different than Denver and New York.