Over 1,000 Mennonites killed in Ethiopia
Let us pray Violence has devastated Meserete Kristos Church (MKC), the Mennonite body in Ethiopia. As of February 12, armed groups had burned 49 MKC churches to the ground, looted and damaged another 81 churches, and killed 1,231 MKC members, including 31 church leaders. Inter-tribal violence in western Oromiya regional state, home to nearly one…
Congregation steps up in absence of pastor
When the people of Danforth Mennonite Church in Toronto realized they needed to carry on without a pastor, they took a closer look at “the things that a pastor really does.” Mike DeHaan, who is chair of the church council, says the circulation of responsibilities officially commenced on February 1, the day after Stephen Reist’s…
Beyond revenge: The story of Maoz Inon
Maoz Inon is an Israeli Jewish social entrepreneur and peace advocate. During a February online event—Part I of the Peace & Possibility events—he shared the story of his parents being murdered by Hamas and his family’s astonishing journey to peace. The following excerpts are from an online event with Inon that Canadian Mennonite convened in…
‘Stuck together’ at MCBC AGM
With the theme of “Stuck Together,” delegates from all 23 congregations rejoiced together, wrestled with a budget deficit and welcomed a new church plant at the 2024 Mennonite Church B.C. annual meeting. Prayers were offered throughout the day in various languages spoken in MCBC congregations: Spanish, German, Hmong, Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese and Chinese. The…
‘What do you do with an unjust benefit?’
For John Stoesz, making land reparations to Indigenous communities is a way to follow Jesus. In 2012, Stoesz’s family sold his grandparents’ farm near Mountain Lake, Minnesota. Stoesz returned half the proceeds of his share of the inheritance to Indigenous groups working for land justice. Mountain Lake is in the southwestern part of the state.…
The meaning of seeds
At 9 a.m., it was already hot and humid in Hopelchén, a small city in the Yucatán peninsula. A collective of Maya farmers had gathered in the shaded courtyard outside the home where we were staying. We could hear laughter and chatter over the wall as we returned from our morning walk. As we stepped…
Saskatchewan sidesteps First Nations in selling Crown land
First Nations in Saskatchewan are in conflict with the provincial government regarding the sale of Crown land. Indigenous peoples in the province have treaty rights to use government-owned land for hunting, fishing and gathering. They also purchase Crown land to fulfill outstanding treaty land obligations. As early as 2007, the provincial government started…
Giving back to the land
Our farmyard opened from its treelines to the south and southwest. A mile south, I could see the shelterbelts surrounding my paternal grandmother’s 1870s homestead. A few farmyards were dotted out in the horizon in the southwest, but looking that direction was mostly for watching weather systems develop, dissipate or roll in. Truth be…
A spiritual covenant with churches and First Nations
A most promising possibility for a tangible response by churches to past injustice in the Six Nations Grand River lands conflict came from a conversation I had after the monthly meeting of the Haudenosaunee Council at Onondaga Longhouse on Saturday, March 3, 2007. At this meeting, Mennonite Central Committee Ontario introduced me as Community Liaison…
Small steps toward reparation
Ten years ago, Adrian Jacobs of the Six Nations Haudenosaunee Confederacy proposed a Spiritual Covenant with Mennonite churches located on the Haldimand Tract. One Kitchener church is now looking closely at that challenge. The Haldimand Tract includes the land six miles (9.7 kilometres) to either side of the Grand River, from Dundalk, Ontario, to…
