Island Catholic News board member Steve Bentheim died unexpectedly in September. He was undergoing an operation in Kelowna and did not survive the procedure. He was 65 years of age.
    Eighteen months previous Steve had undergone a similar procedure to remove a benign brain tumour which was not expected to recur. In August of 2013 he moved to Kelowna where he lived previously.
    Steve was the father of four children; two, Alana and Gabriel, reside in Victoria. He was buried at the Congregation Emanu-El Jewish Cemetery on Cedar Hill Road at Fernwood in Victoria. His sudden death stunned many in the greater Victoria multifaith, therapeutic and literary communities who showed up in good numbers at his burial.

Island Catholic News board member Steve Bentheim died unexpectedly in September. He was undergoing an operation in Kelowna and did not survive the procedure. He was 65 years of age.
    Eighteen months previous Steve had undergone a similar procedure to remove a benign brain tumour which was not expected to recur. In August of 2013 he moved to Kelowna where he lived previously.
    Steve was the father of four children; two, Alana and Gabriel, reside in Victoria. He was buried at the Congregation Emanu-El Jewish Cemetery on Cedar Hill Road at Fernwood in Victoria. His sudden death stunned many in the greater Victoria multifaith, therapeutic and literary communities who showed up in good numbers at his burial.
    I first met Steve Bentheim through publishers and mutual friends Richard Olafson and Carole Sokoloff. Steve was a regular visitor to their home which served as the office of their publishing firm, Ekstasis Editions. Steve was doing his doctorate in counselling at UVic in this period, focusing on the pioneer work of Virginia Satir in family counselling.
 I was able to provide him with names of Catholic married couples who he interviewed extensively for his thesis. In the last five years he was employed as a counsellor with the Salvation Army. He also resided at St. Andrew Victoria housing during the same period so we were neighbours.
    As a result he came to serve on the ICN board and was an able communicator at ICN sponsored events. The most recent was a book launch for author Dan Gawthrop's 'The Trial of Pope Benedict (Arsenal Press) at Victoria Public Library in late July.
    An editor, he founded an international website on the work of Virginia Satir. One of his colleagues spoke of his contribution at the graveside ceremony in Victoria. The main speaker was Steve’s son Gabriel who expressed what he appreciated most about his father’s parenting attentiveness.
    Steve and Gabriel got into habit of watching some major sports events at my father’s condominium, including The Super Bowl, The Grey Cup and the World Cup finals in soccer. As a result my father was one of sixty who attended the funeral, officiated by Rabbi Louis Sutker, also a professional counsellor.
    As a young man, Steve was trained in Jewish schools and Yeshivas took pride in his own rabbinical training experience. Later he came under the influence of the teacher Ram Dass and always considered himself primarily of Hindu orientation. Of multifaith orientation, Steve was constantly working on new project ideas to further religious unity in the direction of his primary passion, global peace. He was part of the Christian Science community.
    Inspired by what he experienced in the Okanagan of the work of Oblate pioneer Father Pandosy, Steve was still refining his final script for a play by the title of Pandosy. It has already been performed in a workshop version in Kelowna at the site of the legendary cleric’s work.