Larry Updike and Sandy Koop-Harder share a laugh during a discussion event at Canadian Mennonite University. (Photo courtesy of Instagram.com/cmuwpg)
Why does polarization so frequently characterize our discourse? How can people find common ground?
Those were two of the questions at the heart of “Us and Them: How did we become so polarized?”, a panel discussion held at Canadian Mennonite University (CMU) earlier this month.
Believers in Wuhan, China, distribute medical supplies. (Photo courtesy of Jeanette Hanson)
With the coronavirus continuing to impact people around the world, Mennonite World Conference (MWC) has called for Anabaptist and Mennonite congregations everywhere to unite in prayer and to exercise precautionary measures in the church.
Lawan Andimi, a pastoral leader in the Nigerian Church of the Brethren, was executed by Boko Haram, an extremist Jihadi group. Prior to the killing, Boko Haram released a video in which Andimi steadfastly affirmed his faith. (Photo courtesy of YouTube)
On Jan. 20, Lawan Andimi, a pastoral leader in the Nigerian Church of the Brethren, was executed by Boko Haram, an extremist Jihadi group. He had been reported missing on Jan. 3, the day after a Boko Haram attack in his area.
Valentine's Day is celebrated worldwide with more than 100 million roses and 1 billion cards sent every year. (Image by Karolina Grabowska/Pixabay)
Whether you scoff at the billion-dollar industry that Feb. 14 has become or use the day to show your affection for the people you love—or something in between—there’s no denying that Valentine’s Day has a fascinating backstory.
This video, from the One Minute History channel on YouTube, gives a 60-second overview of the day’s origins.
Regional representatives Jeremiah Choi (from left) Jumanne Magiri Mafwiri and Freddy Iban Barrón Tapia.
A composer, health manager and auto mechanic—all church leaders—have joined the Mennonite World Conference team.
Nadine Ens and her daughter Jenice Ens tie knots in a comforter at The Great Winter Warm-up in Saskatoon, Sask. (MCC photo by Myriam Ullah)
On Jan. 18, the forecast in more than 100 locations across three continents was identical: flurries of comforters.
Musicians, in foreground from left, Merrill Miller, Alissa Bender, Perry Blosser, Rosene Rohrer and Andrea Weber Steckly accompany a song during the Worship and Music Leaders Retreat on Jan. 10-12 at Laurelville retreat center in Mount Pleasant, Pa. (Photo by Kreg Ulery)
In the 1980s, Ken Nafziger drew inspiration from publisher and camp association president Levi Miller, and began leading a music retreat at Laurelville.
Tobia Veith, centre in blue top with scarf, teaches a group of Chinese women. (Photo courtesy of Tobia Veith)
Mennonite Church Canada is inviting prayers for its ministry partners during the coronavirus outbreak, and for all of those in China and across the world who have been affected by the virus.
Victoria Callow is currently living and serving in La Mesa, Colombia. (Photo courtesy of YouTube)
Victoria Callow entered the SALT program after graduating from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, with a degree in English education. (Photo courtesy of YouTube)
Our recent Focus on Education issue featured a reflection by Hannah Larson, a young woman serving in northeastern India with Mennonite Central Committee’s Serving and Learning Together program.
Notes of peaceful encouragement are written to those caught up in the political protests in Hong Kong. (Photo courtesy of Mennonite World Conference)
A joint delegation from the Peace and Deacons commissions of Mennonite World Conference (MWC) visited three Mennonite churches in Hong Kong, other denominations and some educational institutions, to offer solidarity and to respond to the request for further perspectives on Anabaptist peacemaking.
Katie Sowers, pictured with her mother at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California last month. Sowers is the second woman to hold a coaching position in the NFL. (Photo courtesy of Instagram.com/katesowers5)
Katie Sowers will make history next weekend as the first woman and first openly gay person to coach during the Super Bowl.
This store in New Hamburg, Ont. is one of the TTV locations that will close by the end of May.
Mennonite Central Committee Canada has announced the closure of the corporate operations of Ten Thousand Villages Canada, its fair-trade social enterprise.
Mennonite World Conference staff have released a new video in advance of Anabaptist World Fellowship Sunday. The video highlights MWC's work around the world in 2019. (Photo courtesy of MWC)
A new video highlights what happened in the Mennonite World Conference (MWC) in 2019.
Released in advance of Anabaptist World Fellowship Sunday, which takes place this weekend (Jan. 19, 2020), the five-minute video explores MWC’s pursuit of “justice across barriers," as well as the work of its four commissions.
Randall Koehler is an AMBS MDiv Connect student from Benson, Ill. (Photo by Peter Ringenberg)
Randall Koehler wants to explore how Anabaptist theology might shape the mission of the church in a rural context.
Sarah Johnson, a 2003 alumna of Rockway Mennonite Collegiate in Kitchener, will speak at a special chapel at the school next month. (Photo courtesy of Facebook.com/VoicesTogetherHymnal)
Rockway Mennonite Collegiate in Kitchener, Ont. marks 75 years of mission in 2020.
Sarah Johnson, a 2003 alumna, will be the guest speaker at a special Founders’ Day chapel at the school on Feb. 9, from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. She will explore the question, “What does it mean to be a Mennonite school in a diverse and evolving global environment?”
Assembly program committee members Estifanos Gedlu of Ethiopia, Ben Bergey of the United States, Jessica Mondal Lakra of India, Jardeley Martinez of Colombia, Natalie Frisk of Canada, MWC chief events coordinator Liesa Unger, assembly national co-coordinator Agus Setianto and volunteer coordinator Tigist Gelagle are pictured at the Holy Stadium in Semarang, Indonesia, where next year’s global assembly will be held. (MWC photo by Karla Braun)
A six-person program committee met last November to develop the activities and schedule of the 2021 Mennonite World Conference (MWC) global assembly in Indonesia next July. The six come from five different continents and span the decades from their 20s to their 60s.
Menno Simons students help pack Christmas Child shoeboxes for Samaritan’s Purse. (Photo courtesy of Menno Simons Christian School)
Over the past few years Menno Simons Christian School in Calgary, Alta.
'This is one of the ways we show God’s love to people.' MCC comforters are sent to places like Jordan, Haiti and Ukraine, where they are used in a variety of ways. (Photo courtesy of YouTube)
Volunteers across Canada are preparing to participate in Mennonite Central Committee’s Great Winter Warm-up.
MCC is hoping that these volunteers will produce 6,500 comforters during the event, which takes place on Saturday, Jan. 18, 2020.
Aleksandr Dmitriyenko holds MCC comforters he received in Zhytomyr, Ukraine, in 2016 during distribution to people displaced by violence in the eastern part of the country. (MCC photo by Colin Vandenberg)
Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) will kick off its 100-year anniversary celebration in 2020 by bringing together volunteers in Canada, the United States and Europe to make 6,500 comforters in one day.
Refresh Mobile Showers has provided more than 550 showers since May 1. (Photo courtesy of YouTube)
When Henry Penner saw a need in his community, he decided to meet that need.
The Abbotsford, B.C. resident, along with King Road Mennonite Brethren Church, operates a mobile shower trailer for people who are experiencing homelessness.
Refresh Mobile Showers has provided more than 550 showers since the unique operation started almost eight months ago.
'Growing up in Kansas, there was one particular cookie that was a staple at every holiday event: peppernuts.' (Photo by Kristin Hoffman/BakerBettie.com)
If you’re interested in making peppernuts this holiday season and the recipe on our website won’t cut it, you’re in luck: Kristin “Baker Bettie” Hoffman has just the thing for you.
Students in the Worship Apprentice Program at Conrad Grebel University College, including Rowan Martin (left) and Eunice Femi-Gege (right), tested their skills by leading worship at St. Agatha (Ont.) Mennonite Church on Nov. 17. (Photo by Fred W. Martin)
Students in the Worship Apprentice Program at Conrad Grebel University College come from a wide range of academic programs and church denominations. Pictured from left to right: Chris Fischer, Professor Kate Steiner, Matthias Mostert, Eunice Femi-Gege, Mykayla Turner and Rowan Martin. (Photo by Margaret Gissing)
When students in Grebel’s Worship Apprentice Program led worship at St. Agatha (Ont.) Mennonite Church in November, Colin Friesen, left, a master of theological studies student, joined them and gave the message. Also pictured, from left to right: Rowan Martin, Matthias Mostert, Yeabsra Agonfer, Eunice Femi-Gege, and Mykayla Turner. (Photo by Fred W. Martin)
Every Tuesday, a diverse team of University of Waterloo students gathers for prayer, small group discussion, song teaching and worship-service planning. These students are part of the Worship Apprentice Program offered by Conrad Grebel University College’s Music Department as a skill-building opportunity within the Church Music and Worship Program.
'When the teachers are having fun, the students pick up on it.' (Photo courtesy of YouTube)
“You Need to Calm Down” may be a song in which pop superstar Taylor Swift addresses her detractors, but in the hands of the coaching staff at Rockway Mennonite Collegiate, it’s a song about trying out for athletics.
Soba Bika Sunchiuri shows some of the vegetables she is growing in a plastic house provided by MCC, which helps her to grow plants in spite of irregular rainfall and deluges caused by climate change. (MCC photo by Luke Reesor-Keller)
With the technical help of Brethren in Community Welfare Society, Hulai Rishidev’s cabbage field is thriving. (Photo courtesy of BICWS/Mahendra Yadav)
Sunita Tamang holds her child, Emma Tamang, 2, in front of her newly built plastic house and the drip irrigation system she will use to grow vegetables in South Lalitpur, Nepal. (MCC photo by Avash Karki)
The weather patterns in Nepal used to be regular about 15 to 20 years ago, says Durga Sunchiuri, who grew up helping his parents farm their land in the mountainous terraces of Nepal’s Terhathum District. Not anymore.
David Widdicombe, an Anglican priest, left, and Gordon Zerbe, professor of New Testament at CMU, answer questions. (Photos by Beth Downey-Sawatzky)
David Widdicombe, an Anglican priest, says that the climate crisis demands that Christians turn their primary theological and devotional attentions to three tasks: mitigation of ecological damage, adaptation to climate change, and suffering, which is inevitable.
Singer-songwriter Steve Bell performed at the opening and close of CMU’s climate-change lecture.
Students, scholars and community members alike filled Marpeck Commons at Canadian Mennonite University (CMU) on Nov. 13, hoping to lay a firmer hold on one essential subject: Actionable theology for the age of climate change.
