2020 | CBC | Notice Pictures Inc | feature doc

Associate Producer

Directed by Ali Weinstein

C3 is an Evangelical church that opened in Toronto in 2013, quickly amassing a large following amongst the city’s young, hip and tattooed. #BLESSED is an intimate look inside this fast-growing millennial church following the process of selling salvation in the 21st century.

As Pastor Sam and his team grow the church from two locations to three, we start to explore the lives of some of its young members. Aspiring pastor David works on a new and chaste relationship with his girlfriend Mona as he prepares to go to C3 College in Australia for a year; former party girl Aimee does a 180 as she turns from coke and a relationship with a woman to a celibate and church-centred life; and Conan throws himself deeper into the church community while struggling to believe. Tying all these stories together is Galen, a young academic fascinated by the church's pull, all the while questioning its tactics.

Much like other viral church start-ups of the 21st century, C3 is tapping into something very real and apparently very needed in the hearts of millennials. While Sam and his team have given church a modern rebranding, it becomes clear as the characters’ stories unfold that what these youth are searching for is not new at all. It is in fact fundamental -- the age old need to be part of something bigger than oneself. But how will C3’s new converts react to its conservative Christian values hidden beneath its shiny new packaging?