Thrift shopper, peacebuilder
Categories: OpinionI was walking to church for an event a few weeks back and stopped by our local Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) thrift store for my usual weekly peek and to say hello to the dear ladies who faithfully volunteer their…
Being the church in risky times
Categories: OpinionAs relatively privileged people living in Canada, there aren’t too many times that we think about whether this action or that action might result in our death. Living in these pandemic times, though, reminds me of our years living in…
‘Greater love has no one . . .’
Categories: Opinion“Greater love has no one than to lay their life down for their friends,” said Jesus. That’s an amazing thing for anyone to do. But what about a whole village laying down its life for people it doesn’t even know?…
What makes us Mennonite?
Categories: Opinion“Talking about ‘a’ Mennonite identity seems passé,” wrote Marlene Epp in 2018. Still, Epp, a member of a pre-eminent family of Mennonite historians, is more than willing to talk about Mennonite identity. Discussion of what holds us as Mennonites together…
Readers write: March 16, 2020 issue
Categories: OpinionComments on Wet’suwet’en article divided Re: “Who do you support when a community is divided?” Feb. 17, page 20. I believe Ross W. Muir covered the recent blockade in British Columbia by the Wet’suwet’en people very well. What bothers me…
Living into a new imagination
Categories: OpinionOnce upon a time, around 35 years ago, God brought into the world some new people. These people have grown up to love Jesus and follow him with all of their lives. They have also responded to the impulse of…
Manitoba historical society
Categories: OpinionThe work of community remembering is important work. Archives, historical societies, libraries and museums all have a role in a community to remind us who we are and help point us to where we should go. Sometimes we have been…
‘O, you gorgeous man!’
Categories: OpinionI recently sat with a friend for lunch and conversation. I had not seen her for almost three years. At one point she reached across the table, grasped both of my hands in hers, and exclaimed, “O, you gorgeous man!” If…
The gift of imagination
Categories: OpinionI remember the feeling with such clarity: that furious, terrified, sick-to-your-stomach despair one feels when you are numerous pages into writing an academic paper and the computer freezes and you’re unsure if it was saved. Rebooting and reopening the document brings…
Climate change as a spiritual crisis
Categories: OpinionWhen Luke Gascho and Jennifer Schrock of Goshen College’s Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center invited me to help lead efforts to engage Mennonite churches on climate change, it felt like a call from the Spirit. I felt prepared because I…
Report names Jean Vanier as an abuser
Categories: Web First – OpinionOn Feb. 22, L’Arche International released a summary report of the abuse investigation of their deceased founder, Jean Vanier. It concluded he had sexually abused six women over a period of 35 years. Vanier was a celebrated Canadian theologian and…
The perfect complexity of Coastal GasLink protests
Categories: Web First – OpinionIn 2012, I spent two memorable hours in Smithers, B.C., with Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chief Na’Moks (John Ridsdale), one of the chiefs at the centre of the Coastal GasLink crisis now confounding our nation. I also spent time with the chief…
Structure and identity
Categories: OpinionAfter Gathering 2019 last summer, Doug Klassen, then newly hired as executive minister of Mennonite Church Canada, sat down with me for a chat in the Abbotsford, B.C., airport. Amid the chatter of travellers and loudspeaker announcements, we considered the…
Readers write: March 2, 2020 issue
Categories: OpinionReader pans new Trumpian Middle East peace plan, favours ‘one state’ solution Having worked in the private agriculture sector with various Middle East countries, including Israel, for 45 years, I submit that one should be pessimistic about the newly proposed…
God is inclusive, not exclusive!
Categories: OpinionThere are many changes in Canadian society today that compel us to be trained in “diversity and inclusion.” As Christians, what direction do we find in our own biblical texts? When Jesus first returned to his hometown, he read a…
Twilight Auction
Categories: OpinionIn this scene from Twilight Auction by John L. Ruth, young Harvard-educated Sam confronts his traditional Mennonite family’s willingness to sell treasured family heirlooms. Doug Millar, left, is the father, and Dale Shantz, holding the vase, plays Sam in this…
Making things right
Categories: OpinionI read the note from my son’s teacher and my heart sank. As the kids unpacked their backpacks and had a snack, I stood still in the kitchen feeling disappointed, sad and perplexed. My sweet seven-year-old boy, raised in a…
Partners in the body of Christ
Categories: OpinionStrange, I know, but I like to read financial statements. I remember, in my early 20s, listening to the treasurer in our Toronto congregation explain how to understand financial statements when they were meaningless to me. Since then, I have…
The snowball effect
Categories: OpinionThe snowball effect refers to a situation in which something starts off small or insignificant and increases in size or importance at an accelerating rate. Like when you roll a small snowball through wet snow and it accumulates more and…
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