To talk about God
When I started seminary three years ago, I realized I didn’t know how to talk about God. I was motivated to go to seminary because of my love for the Mennonite church. I wanted to deepen my understanding of how the church can draw people into forms of life…
Am I Mennonite?
Although I’ve been a Mennonite pastor for over 25 years, I’m reluctant to call myself Mennonite. For several reasons. First, there’s an ethno-cultural component to the Mennonite identity that I lack. One does not simply become Mennonite, one is born Mennonite. Plenty of Mennonites would disagree with…
Indigenous relations are not science fiction
It has been more than eight years since the Truth and Reconciliation Commission released its final report, including 94 Calls to Action that various levels of government and religious communities committed themselves to implementing. Indigenouswatchdog.org is one of the sources…
Gathering matters more than you think
I am a huge advocate for the local church. It is the gathering of people around the life, teaching, death and resurrection of Jesus that frees our imaginations and forms our hearts to be a different kind of nation on…
The maize of peace
By avocation, I am an historian with a strong interest in global geopolitics, so it feels odd to be a subsistence farmer. I spend much of my time just meeting my daily needs, while hearing about wars in Ukraine, Gaza…
One more on unity and diversity
I’ve been writing this column for four-and-a-half years, and I’m sure I’ve used the same ideas more than once. In this, my last column, I return to the two core ideas that I get passionate about the most often. There…
Lessons from the medicine wheel
Each year, A Common Word Alberta brings Muslims and Christians together in Edmonton to plan an annual interfaith dialogue. As the facilitator of Mennonite Church Alberta’s Bridge Building network (a re-imagined role that continues the good work of Donna Entz,…
Nothing new under the sun
In Ndebele, my language, we have a proverb that says, Inala kayihambi, kuhamba indlala. It says that times of abundant harvest are not reported, but times of hunger and famine make good news. Too true. All news worth reporting, in…
Circling back to simplicity
Categories: OpinionI’ve been thinking about simplicity. Are today’s Canadian Mennonites committed to faith-motivated simple living? Am I? I first encountered the spiritual discipline of simplicity 20 years ago when I read Richard Foster’s Celebration of Discipline. I had grown up in…
See all of us
Categories: OpinionGrace has increasingly become my lens for reading both scripture and other people. I have come to think grace—the wildly undeserved favour dispensed by God—is the most important feature of the gospel. Grace helps me ponder alternative understandings of biblical…
Readers write: February 9, 2024
Categories: OpinionHistory lesson Will Braun’s editorial about Di Brandt (“The institution of messiness,” September 22, 2023) is a valuable piece that I hope many people will read. In the past two centuries, the arts have gone through an unprecedented transition in…
Responding to God’s call
New Year’s Day is often a time we reflect on the events and experiences of the past year. It is also the time we look forward to what might lie ahead. At the beginning of 2023, I received an email…
In due season
Categories: OpinionWhen I first started working out at a CrossFit gym, my muscles ached constantly. After a few months, I asked one of the trainers, “When does the pain go away?” After clarifying what kind of pain I was referring to,…
A different kind of yes-man
Categories: OpinionSince Will Braun’s strong editorial in the December 1, 2023, issue (“What kind of peace church are we?”), the pages of Canadian Mennonite have included some passionate responses. This is a good thing. Perhaps I’ll add one more. I begin…
The unend of this story
Categories: OpinionHow many sermons do you remember from 25 years ago? Likely not many. Even the most meaningful and formative sermons from long ago tend to fade and become less a specific memory and more an unrecallable influential moment; a ripple…
Thoughts for our unfinished journey
Categories: OpinionBecoming an intercultural church does not happen by accident or by wishful thinking. It takes a lifetime to create space in which everyone can gather and be welcomed, celebrated, integrated and reconciled to God and one another. This new humanity…
Speaking in tongues: 5 responses to 2 key stats
Categories: OpinionThe following is adapted from a sermon that Kevin Barkowsky, pastor of Sherbrooke Mennonite Church in Vancouver, preached on January 28. Reprinted with permission. Key Stat #1: Across the world, English Mennonite churches are shrinking, and non-English Mennonite churches are…
A modest proposal
Categories: OpinionThe question was how churches in North America could directly communicate their support to Palestin- ian churches. It came during a December 18 call that Mennonite Central Committee convened with four Palestinian pastors and several dozen North Americans. Pastor Ashraf…
Readers Write, January 26, 2024
Categories: OpinionLiterature saves lives Your editorial and feature interview with Di Brandt struck a chord (“Poetic justice,” September 22, 2023). I have been reading Brandt’s poetry and essays for decades; her poem, questions i asked my mother changed—no, saved—my life, as…
Seek the blessing of your city
“That’s great!” That is my usual response when I speak with individuals and churches who name a desire to engage their neighbourhoods more actively, or to be a mission presence in their community. And yet, at some point in every…
Opinion/columns
