The Spirit is moving our body
I knew everything would be okay as soon as the singing started. As I sat at a table positioned behind a small tower of crates half covered in cloth—a makeshift platform for the room’s main projector—I looked up from my detailed program schedule and smiled. Right, this is why we’re here. “Gathering 2019: Igniting the…
Holy Spirit fire and imagination
“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 voices was the vision, “Igniting the imagination of the church,” the theme of Gathering 2019, held in Abbotsford, B.C., from June 28 to July 1. Representatives came…
Readers write: July 22, 2019 issue
Headline ‘diminishes and sensationalizes’ church article Re: “Church ditches ‘overt religiosity’ to become ‘community resource,’ ” May 27, page 18. We were delighted to connect with John Long-hurst when he expressed interest in writing an article about our recent Calgary Inter-Mennonite Church’s renovation project. We have been grateful for funding from a community foundation to…
Things I noticed at Gathering 2019
I didn’t used to get nervous leading singing. There were times before leading at Mennonite Church Canada’s Gathering 2019 when I was nervous. I was less nervous leading 6,500 youth and sponsors at the St. Louis ’99 Youth Convention than some points before leading a few hundred in Abbotsford, B.C., last month. It’s made me wonder…
Centennial celebration
New Canadian initiatives around multiculturalism in the 1970s—celebrating anniversaries like Canada’s centennial in 1967, Manitoba’s in 1970, and the arrival of Mennonites in Manitoba in 1974—created a new energy and appreciation for history in Canada. During these years, the Mennonite Heritage Centre and the Archives of Ontario hired permanent staff. Energy was put into founding…
Millie, my lions and me
In early June, a sermon was delivered by a mother-daughter team in Tiefengrund Rosenort Mennonite Church in Saskatchewan. The daughter, Abby, is 12. From time to time, the growing whiteness of my hair and whiskers seems to dictate that I offer opinions about how we do church. About how we obsess over smoothness and perfect…
Nationwide church experiences modest surplus
A much simplified Mennonite Church Canada organization turned an expected $239,000 deficit into a surplus of $42,000 for the fiscal year ended (FYE) Jan. 31, 2019. The modest surplus was the result of higher-than-forecast revenue from the regional churches, and lower- than-expected expenses in nearly every budget category. In the new church structure, adopted in October…
Good news of Jesus in a traumatized world
The way of the missional God is that the Word became flesh and blood and moved into the neighbourhood, Elaine Heath told church leaders on June 28 at Gathering 2019’s Leadership Day. Heath is a former dean of Duke University Divinity School in Durham, N.C., and an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church. Much…
‘Firestarter stories’ spark the imagination of the church
“My job is to love the people in my neighbourhood, accept them for who they are and create a safe place where they are welcome,” said Lyne Renaud, pastor of Hochma in Montreal, as she shared her “firestarter story” to spark the imagination of the church at Mennonite Church Canada’s Gathering 2019. Lyne, along with…
