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Ivan Foster (born 1943)W.D. Flackes & S. Elliott, Northern Ireland: A Political Directory 1968-1993, Belfast: Blackstaff Press, 1994, p. 165 is a retired senior minister in the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster and a former Democratic Unionist Party politician. He was a lifelong friend and associate of the Democratic Unionist politician and Free Presbyterian Church leader Ian Paisley, who along with Foster and Peter Robinson, co-founded the organisation Ulster Resistance in 1986 with the aim of importing arms to support loyalist paramilitarism during "The Troubles", but in November 2006 he became the most prominent Free Presbyterian to openly challenge Ian Paisley's decision to enter into a power-sharing government with Sinn Féin and went on to denounce Ian Paisley from the pulpit of his church in January 2007.
Since March 1970, he has edited The Burning Bush, a magazine describing itself as 'a Protestant witness in a time of Apostasy', which began life as a congregational newsletter. This magazine is not an official publication of the Free Presbyterian Church. Originally distributed free of charge, a subscription fee was set in 1999. Foster also operates a Christian fundamentalist website. He has also undertaken Evangelism missions in Canada and was for many years the head of the Free Presbyterian Education Board. Foster and his wife pioneered Christian education in Ulster, setting up a congregational school in Kilskeery and supporting many other Christian education endeavors, not only in Ulster but further afield.
Foster has also gained a reputation as an outspoken critic. He has denounced the Belfast-born Christian writer and apologist C.S. Lewis as an 'apostate'. 'CS Lewis-safe guide/confused soul?' He is also outspokenly in favour of corporal punishment and in 2001, in response to a public debate about the British Government's plans to ban corporal punishment in the home, he condemned the NSPCC as having a part in an 'evil' plan to abolish it. Foster retired from the ministry of Kilskeery Free Presbyterian Church in November 2008. He remains active as a minister in his retirement.
As a minister during the Troubles, Foster was involved in the funerals of a number of loyalists.Bruce, Paisley, p. 221 He also conducted the funeral of Larne UVF man Sinclair Johnston in 1972, although in this case Foster and Johnston were related.Bruce, Paisley, p. 222
Foster was a member of the DUP during the 1980s being a member of Omagh District Council Fermanagh and South Tyrone 1973-1982 and winning a seat in the Northern Ireland assembly elections of 1982 for the Fermanagh and South Tyrone constituency.
Foster was the commander of the Fermanagh battalion of Paisley's vigilante group, the Third Force, one of the few regions of the group that undertook any real activity. Along with George Graham and other DUP supporters, Foster was arrested in summer 1985 after an unsuccessful attempt to smash police lines preventing a loyalist band from marching in Castlewellan, an event to which Foster had publicly threatened to bring Third Force members.Bruce, Paisley, p. 212 He gained his greatest notoriety in 1986 when he was one of the three founders of Ulster Resistance. Ulster Resistance from CAIN
Subsequently, Foster abandoned political life to concentrate on his work as a Free Presbyterian minister, having decided that the policies of the DUP were becoming too liberal.Malcolm Anderson and Eberhard Bort, The Irish Border: History, Politics, Culture, p. 132 He formally announced his resignation from the party in 1989, adding particular criticism of the close relationship between Paisley and Ulster Unionist Party leader Jim Molyneaux, which Foster felt was compromising DUP independence.Bruce, Paisley, pp. 112-113
He subsequently became outspoken in the political path taken by Ian Paisley. This began on Thursday 23 November 2006, when Foster gave interviews to the media and met with Ian Paisley in person to express his concerns that the DUP were considering forming a power-sharing government in Northern Ireland, under the terms of the St Andrews Agreement. Paisley-SF move 'heartbreaking' Foster's condemnation grew stronger on Sunday 7 January 2007 when, in a sermon lasting 70 minutes, Foster denounced Dr. Paisley because of his apparent willingness to enter into a coalition government with Sinn Féin. In the sermon, (entitled Where have we gone astray? -- A Question for Free Presbyterians) which was also webcast, Foster said, "We do pray for Dr. Paisley and I never thought I would see the day that I would stand in this pulpit and say I think him wrong entirely and say I could never support what he is doing, but that day has come."
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