It takes a (global) village
Categories: Feature ArticlesThe last in a five-part series leading up to Mennonite World Conference Assembly in Harrisburg, Pa. When someone asks you to use a few words to describe yourself, what words…
The Sermon on the Mount: living it out in mind and heart
Categories: Feature ArticlesI was down in Mississippi, at a small African-American church. My parents were volunteering there with a ministry that had many different programs going. They had a farm, a clinic,…
Asking passively, seeking aggressively
Categories: Feature Articles“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake?” (Matthew 7:9-10). I have…
Journeying towards reconciliation
Categories: Feature ArticlesThe journey towards reconciliation is not easy. Attempts to repair wrongs involve time and intentionality. Healing broken relationships takes longer still. In 2009, Canada began a Truth and Reconciliation Commission…
Pushing back with colour
Categories: Feature ArticlesWhat do you do in the face of hatred, a hatred so immense that it drives people to pillage, beat and even kill others? What do you do when that…
Mennonite Christians are unique
Categories: Feature ArticlesJust as there are Lutheran, Baptist and Anglican Christians, so there are Mennonite Christians. The name “Mennonite” is most appropriately used as an adjective rather than a noun. We are…
A love for all seasons
Categories: Feature Articles“Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away; for lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth; the time of…
Mennonite me
Categories: Feature ArticlesMy grandmother’s church is, like all Old Order Mennonite churches, plain. The white walls are bare. There are no stained-glass windows, no gilded altars and no images of saints or…
Out of control
Categories: Feature Articles“A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the master; it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the slave like the master.…
Correcting a common misunderstanding
Categories: Feature ArticlesMatthew 10:37 reads, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”…
Healing the wounded city
Categories: Feature ArticlesFor many people, the Christian faith and poverty are deeply interconnected. Acts of charity are widely viewed as a key aspect of the Christian life, and the church has…
The birth of Anabaptism in fire and water
Categories: Feature ArticlesSometimes, a single act can have enormous consequences. In the religious ferment of 16th century Europe, a small group of Christians in the Swiss canton of Zurich gathered in a…
Facing history with courage
Categories: Feature Articles“History,” wrote American poet Maya Angelou more than 20 years ago, “despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.” Canada’s Truth…
Definition: ‘Settler’
Categories: Feature ArticlesThe term “settler” for Canadians of European descent was popularized by Roger Epp in his 2008 book, We are all Treaty People. This term acknowledges—rather than ignores—the conflicted history of…
Making ‘restorative solidarity’ work
Categories: Feature ArticlesIn an appendix to Ambassadors of Reconciliation, Vol. II: Diverse Christian Practices of Restorative Justice and Peacemaking (Orbis Books), which I co-wrote, I explored the question of how principles and…
The joy of pizza
Categories: Feature ArticlesMy wife Rachel and I wanted to start practising radical hospitality, but we live in a cosy basement apartment. It would be so much easier if we had our own…
Potluck picnics in the park
Categories: Feature ArticlesIf you find yourself in Victoria Park in Kitchener, Ont., on a Thursday evening in the summertime, wander down the tree-lined path and over the bridge until you reach the…
Pulling the curtain of hope over fear
Categories: Feature ArticlesMennonite churches are afraid. In fact, Christian denominations all over Canada are afraid. We have felt this, seen it and experienced it. Sometimes this fear leads denominations to do reckless…
For discussion: Breaking the peace
Categories: Feature Articles1. What acts of servanthood have you seen carried out by church leaders? Do your church leaders take a turn working in the kitchen? What message do they send when…
Breaking the peace
Categories: Feature ArticlesWhat to do?” is our anxious impulse. “In the beginning,” God was revealed in creation before there was anyone to appreciate the self-disclosure this represented. It was long before any…
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