If the Bible is a story, it is also something more: It’s a book that dares to make an authoritative claim on life. Between the poems and proverbs and parables, a portrait is... Read More
Features
‘Face painting phantasm’ (mennopix Digital art by Ross W. Muir)
October 23, 2019 | Feature | Meghan Larissa Good
2007 Flanders fields photo by Tijl Vercaemer (bit.ly/cclicence2-0)
Update: In October 2020, Mennonite Church Eastern Canada announced the termination of the ministerial credentials of John D. Rempel, on the basis of ministerial sexual misconduct... Read More
October 9, 2019 | Feature | John D. Rempel
‘Bring out your dead,’ by Edmund Evans, circa 1864. This coloured wood engraving pictures a medieval street scene with a town crier and a two-wheeled cart making the rounds and collecting the bodies of plague victims; a few people have gathered around a small fire for warmth. (wikimedia.org photo (public domain))
Over the last few months, the reality of the climate crisis we are in the midst of has started to strike me in a new and terrible way. As the best-case scenarios for our planet... Read More
September 25, 2019 | Feature | Gerald Ens
Sandy Shantz holds out offering bowl for Callum Jarvis as he comes to the front of St. Jacobs (Ont.) Mennonite Church to give his gift to God. (Photo by Marcia Shantz)
We are now living in a full-blown digital world. With just one click or voice command we can ask Google for a chicken recipe, order office supplies or give to our favourite... Read More
September 11, 2019 | Feature | Joanne De Jong
Maya Janzen.
As a kid, I grew up with the ritual of walking to the front of my church and dropping a few coins in the donation box every Sunday. But as I was sitting in church several months... Read More
September 11, 2019 | Feature | Nicolien Klassen-Wiebe
Vladimir Kozlov of New Life, an MCC partner, distributes relief kits, school kits, comforters and canned meat in Nikopol, Ukraine, on June 21. (MCC photo by Matt Sawatzky)
Under shade trees in a city park on June 16, about 40 Anabaptists shared a picnic of corn grits, rye bread and warm cocoa. The unusual menu held symbolic meaning. It was a “relief... Read More
August 14, 2019 | Feature | Paul Schrag
Pictured from left to right: Darryl Neustaedter Barg; Bruno Cavalca; John Briner, hidden behind the music stand; and Anneli Loepp Thiessen lead the congregation in songs new and old. The other Gathering 2019 worship team members were Moses Falco, Sarah Johnson, Kathy Lumsden and Glenn Sawatzky. (Photo by Jane Grunau)
“Sing a new church into being,” sang the 300-plus people gathered for the first nationwide meeting of Mennonite Church Canada since its restructuring in 2017. Behind the blended... Read More
July 17, 2019 | Feature | Virginia A. Hostetler
Group photo from a picnic held at Willowgrove Camp in August 1979. Harriet Dick is pictured front left. (Photo courtesy of Harriet Dick)
Toronto United Mennonite Church was the first church in Canada to receive privately sponsored “boat people” who were fleeing Vietnam and Laos during the chaos of the Vietnam War... Read More
June 19, 2019 | Feature | Anne Konrad Dyck
Photo © istock.com/ninamalyna
“O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and grey hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to all... Read More
June 5, 2019 | Feature | Claire Ewert Fisher
A Mennonite church in Ontario recently finished a six-week adult and youth Sunday school series entitled “The opioid crisis: Understanding addiction as a disease.” The six sessions were packed. (Photo © istock.com/wildpixel)
The language is stark: crisis, epidemic, tragedy. The facts are startling. According to a Government of Canada website, opioid-related overdose has become the No. 1 cause of death... Read More
May 22, 2019 | Feature | Janet Bauman
Photo: © istock.com/seventyfour
“I love my church. It is very important to me, but you won’t be seeing me on Sunday morning as often,” Cara Baergen told her congregation in a sermon preached at Edmonton’s First... Read More
May 8, 2019 | Feature | Donita Wiebe-Neufeld
Detail from a window in St. Etheldreda’s Church in London, England, showing Jesus’ Ascension. (Lawrence OP photo [Creative Commons licence BY-NC-ND 2.0])
Preached at Waterloo North Mennonite Church, Waterloo, Ont., on Ascension Sunday, 2018. Based on Luke 24:44-53, Acts 1:1-11, and Ephesians 1:15-23 Today’s readings have made me... Read More
April 24, 2019 | Feature | Leonard G. Friesen
One of Holyrood’s music teams. Pictured from left to right: Cajetan Ngede, Gordon Baergen and Dorathy Chokpelleh. (Photo by Helena Ball)
Near the beginning of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, Frodo speaks memorable words to his fellow hobbit Sam about the adventure that lies before them: “It’s a... Read More
April 10, 2019 | Feature | Werner De Jong
MCC representative Victor Neumann, second from left, in Songkhla, Thailand, with Vietnamese Boat People. Mothers of the pictured children were abducted by pirates. In response to the refugee crisis following the end of the Vietnam War, in 1979, MCC was the first agency to sign a private sponsorship agreement with the Government of Canada, leading hundreds of Mennonite and Brethren in Christ churches in Canada to sponsor and resettle thousands of refugees across the country. (All photos courtesy of MCC)
More than 12,500 refugees have been resettled in Canada by Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) since it negotiated an agreement with the government on March 5, 1979. This historic... Read More
March 27, 2019 | Feature | Jason Dueck
The roundabout on South Clearbrook Road in Abbotsford, B.C., features a giant raspberry sculpture, symbolic of the agricultural heritage of the area. In the background is the Mennonite Heritage Museum. (Photo by Amy Dueckman)
The raspberry capital of Canada, the most charitable city in Canada, the Bible Belt of Canada. These terms have all been used to describe Abbotsford, the site of Mennonite Church... Read More
March 13, 2019 | Feature | Amy Rinner Waddell
(Photo: ‘Summer on Manitoulin 2006 no. 1’ by Ross W. Muir, Mennopix)
God’s creation is now facing unprecedented destruction brought on by human activity. Attentive hunters know this just as well as vegan environmentalists. Caring for the ecosystems... Read More
February 27, 2019 | Feature | Anthony G. Siegrist and Scott Morton Ninomiya
“We are a mystery to ourselves, a bundle of contradictions. We are inherently prone to self-deception, particularly when it comes to justifying our own behaviours and assumptions. We are not nearly as pure or virtuous as we imagine ourselves to be. We are, each one of us, capable of beautiful and terrible things. We are human beings.” (Photo © istock.com/fotogeng)
Something needs to be done about all the hate in the world. This morning I encountered no fewer than three pieces of media expressing incredulity that the internet seems not to... Read More
February 13, 2019 | Feature | Ryan Dueck
photo: © istock.com/Shaiith
There is an old story that when Michelangelo was painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, Pope Julius would come by to yell up at him in the scaffolding, “When will my ceiling... Read More
January 30, 2019 | Feature | Peter Haresnape
Some members of the seventh Mennonite World Conference Presidium, held in Kitchener, Ont., from Aug. 1 to 7, 1962. Pictured from left to right: Paul Showalter of Germany; Hendrik W. Meihuizen of the Netherlands; Erland Waltner of Elkhart, Ind.; Peter Wiens of Paraguay; Harold S. Bender of Goshen, Ind.; and Jesse B. Martin of Kitchener. (David L. Hunsberger / Mennonite Archives of Ontario photo)
As a minister of the Mennonite church in Danzig (now Gdansk, Poland), Hermann Gottlieb Mannhardt knew how to challenge and encourage his congregants in matters of faith and moral... Read More
January 16, 2019 | Feature | Karl Koop
Colombian countryside where FARC guerrillas and the military fought for control before the peace accords were signed. (Photo by Brenda Jewitt)
There we were, standing in a prayer circle holding hands. While not really that unusual, what was extraordinary was that some of the hands we were holding were likely bloody. They... Read More
December 31, 2018 | Feature | Robert J. Suderman
‘Nativity’ (detail), © by Brian T. Kershisnik, 2006. Used by permission.
The Christ Child has arrived. We’ve waited through four weeks of Advent to light that fifth candle, the Christ candle, symbolizing the presence of Christ in our midst. And we feel... Read More
December 12, 2018 | Feature | Susanne Guenther Loewen
Artwork by Emma Unger, Grade 11, Mennonite Collegiate Institute
God of grace, today we pray for peace for the City of Bethlehem. It has had more than its share of conflict, as it has changed from a sleepy little town to a bustling city that is... Read More
November 21, 2018 | Feature | Carol Penner
Artwork by Merle Yin, grade 11, Mennonite Collegiate Institute
From the moment we learned I was pregnant, the baby we longed for was continually on my mind. What would it look like? What kind of personality would it have? How would this baby... Read More
November 21, 2018 | Feature | Carol Penner
‘Joshua passing the River Jordan with the Ark’ (detail), by Benjamin West
We are daily awash in choices and opportunities, and many of us are affluent enough to be able to choose among many options. Many of us make many choices even before we get out... Read More
October 31, 2018 | Feature | Dori Zerbe Cornelsen
‘Potiphar’s wife displays Joseph’s garment,’ by Lucas van Leyden (circa 1512). Notice in the window in the top left corner Joseph can be seen being taken to prison. (Google Art Project)
The Bible is full of stories about people, real people with bodies and minds, and with an array of experiences, relationships and emotions. How odd, then, that we so often turn to... Read More
October 17, 2018 | Feature | Gareth Brandt