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Témoignage d’un pasteur en pleine violence en RDC
Parlant depuis son domicile à Bukavu, en République Démocratique du Congo (RDC), le 23 février, Josué Seleman a raconté des troubles dans la ville de Bukavu depuis l’entrée des rebelles paramilitaires M-23 dans la ville le 14 février, trois semaines après avoir capturé la ville de Goma dans l’est du pays. Seleman est médecin et…
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The immeasurable power of surrender
When David Fitch speaks about church and power, his starting point is not any big thoughts from the seminary classrooms he’s so familiar with or even his experience as pastor of a majority-Black church. It’s the “cesspool” of the Chicago financial sector, where he spent 10 years as a dangerously successful broker and financial manager.…
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Film updates Stoney Knoll story
The new documentary Reserve 107: A Path Forward tells the story of a small grassroots group that built friendships across religious and ethnic lines and motivated the government of Canada to begin repairing an historic injustice. The film, directed by Brad Langendoen of Rebel Sky Media, is a companion to the award-winning 2015 documentary Reserve…
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Control issues
What is more countercultural than submission? In a time of unalienable rights and unfettered individuality, voluntary abdication of power, rights or personal expression is relatively unthinkable. These norms seep into church despite the fact that submitting, yielding and weakness are Gospel bedrock. The central image of our faith is our Saviour, not with a fist…
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Identity face-off
It’s all I could think about in the days leading up to that Thursday in February. That week, in my commutes, in my classes and in my daily tasks, my mind drifted to it. When I turned on the news or visited coffee shops, I heard debates about it. Walking down the street, I noted…
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A tender heart toward sinners
I grew up in a fundamentalist church that championed the phrase, “Love the sinner, hate the sin.” Although it’s arguably biblically based, there are potential problems with this platitude. First, our sense of sin tends to be distorted by our biases. The church I grew up in viewed sin through the lens of personal purity…
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Tending congregation-pastor relations
For many years, the model of ministry within Mennonite Church Canada congregations featured a solo pastor working full-time for a congregation of 100 to 150 members. MC Canada accordingly designed tools and support systems to facilitate such a relationship between pastor and congregation. Three notable examples include our pension plan, benefit plan and annual pastoral…
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Readers Write: April 2025
MCC statement rings hollow for long-time MCCer I am one of the 50-plus people who have come forward with an account of serious mistreatment by Mennonite Central Committee (MCC). After 17 years with MCC, their handling of a staff conflict shattered me. This happened in recent years. For the sake of my personal well-being, I…
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Pastor reports amid violence in DR Congo
Speaking from his home in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo, on February 23, Josué Seleman told of the turmoil in the city after M23 paramilitary rebels entered Bukavu on February 14, three weeks after capturing nearby Goma in the east of the country. Seleman is a medical doctor and pastor of a church that is…
