The ‘sewists’ of Waterloo Region
When Bev Suderman-Gladwell was asked by a physician friend to “leverage her Mennonite connections,” to respond to a time-sensitive need, she had no way of knowing an “extraordinary project” would grow out of that request. Just over a month later, “sewists” (sewing+artists) from across Waterloo Region, Ont., have sewn more than 1,200 homemade gowns, 1,500…
To death’s door and back
Vic Winter was admitted to hospital in Leamington on March 20. In short order his wife Marilyn was sent home while he was sent to the intensive-care unit at the Windsor Regional Hospital, where he was diagnosed with COVID-19 and placed unconscious on a ventilator to help him breathe as he fought for his life.…
Bread in many forms
A century ago, bread was the beginning of the work of Mennonite Central Committee (MCC). Relief kitchens in Ukraine (then southern Russia) fed families who had been displaced and were starving. Neighbours from around the world provided loaves of wholesome dark bread. Now a century later, MCC still works to meet the needs of people who…
Moving with the times
Three times a week, Arnie Nickel leads a 45-minute exercise session for seniors on Zoom, a virtual-meeting app. Participants are enthusiastic and their numbers are growing. It all began eight or nine years ago, when a small group of seniors at Nutana Park Mennonite Church in Saskatoon started an exercise group under the Saskatoon-based Forever…
Century-old photos shed new light on Mennonites
Hundred-year-old images on fragile glass negatives, discovered in a dusty barn in the heritage village of Neubergthal, Man., open a window to Mennonite life in Manitoba in the early 20th century. These photographs, along with other archive collections, make up the new book, Mennonite Village Photography: Views from Manitoba 1890-1940. The volume is a collaborative effort of…
Let’s go on an adventure!
Every year Mennonite Church Alberta offers education bursaries to students who attend a regional-church congregation who have successfully enrolled in a Mennonite or Anabaptist post-secondary institution. In 2019, Claire Dueck, a member of Lethbridge Mennonite Church, was one of eight recipients. Dueck, 18, just completed her first year at Columbia Bible College in Abbotsford, B.C.,…
‘You and me and our neighbours, together’
Garry Janzen and his wife Diane, who live in a condominium in Ladner, B.C., have found a new way to relate to those around them during the current pandemic: the Nextdoor.ca app. Janzen, executive minister of Mennonite Church British Columbia, heard about the app from Adam Back, pastor of Peace Church on 52nd in Vancouver,…
