L to R: Gayle Zacharias, Kathryn Derksen, Michelle Hildebrand, Susanna Derksen, Judy Hildebrand and Jake Plett. (Photo courtesy of Judy Hildebrand)
Addlight Mudombo of Joseph Village, Zimbabwe with comforters she sewed by hand from used clothing. (MCC photo by Meghan Mast)
By Nikki Hamm Gwala
Mennonite Central Committee Manitoba
For Judy Hildebrand of Crystal City, Man., brightly coloured comforters add cheer to long prairie winters.
Melanie and Jonathan Neufeld. (Photo courtesy of Jonathan Neufeld)
If there are places where the church is centring the voices of people on the margins, Jonathan Neufeld wants to be there.
“Theologically, that’s my home,” says Neufeld, Mennonite Church Canada’s Indigenous relations coordinator.
Neufeld began his work at MC Canada, based in Winnipeg, in November. He also works half-time as pastor at Charleswood Mennonite in Winnipeg.
The Lucerna Community Choir, with singers from Point Grey and Chinatown Peace congregations, sings at the “Cross Culture” service in Vancouver. (Photo by Walter Toews)
Six Vancouver Mennonite congregations launched the new year by singing, praying and worshipping together in three languages.
F-35A Lighting II:
Length: 51.4 ft/15.7 m,
Wingspan: 35 ft/10.7 m,
Internal Fuel Capacity: 18,250 lbs/8,278 kg,
Weapons Payload: 18,000 lbs/8,160 kg,
Speed (Full Internal Weapons Load): Mach 1.6 (~1,200 mph),
Range: 2,200km
(Source: F35.com) (Photo released by Lockheed Martin)
From Dirk Willems loving his enemy in 1569 to Colombian Mennonites building peace today, Anabaptists have offered a bold peace witness. But being a peace church is complicated.
Erin Koop Unger, pictured last year at the Mennonite Heritage Village in Steinbach. (Photo by Andrew Unger)
Erin Koop Unger has travelled the world, but these days it’s Manitoba and the Mennonites who live there that have captured her imagination.
Koop Unger is the creator of Mennotoba.com, a website where she writes about Mennonite history and culture in the keystone province.
(Photo courtesy of Tim Albrecht)
(Photo courtesy of Tim Albrecht)
Shop in St. Catharines highlight Raw Carrot soup
packages in the store. (Photo courtesy of Tim Albrecht)
Anneli Loepp Thiessen, left, and Katie Graber are co-directors of the Anabaptist Worship Network. (Photo courtesy of Anneli Loepp Thiessen)
Congregational needs for worship resources and support skyrocketed when the pandemic roared into full swing and people struggled to create meaningful worship experiences in an online world.
Jacquie Loewen building her backyard oven. (Photo by Michelle Burkowski)
One might be able to live on bread alone, at least according to Jacquie Loewen.
The resident of Winnipeg’s West End neighbourhood has spent the past year building a stone oven, learning to bake bread in it, and sharing this bread with her neighbours—all from the comfort of her own backyard.
Youth at United Mennonite Church of Black Creek, B.C., with socks they collected. (Photo courtesy of Marian Peckford)
The youth group at United Mennonite Church of Black Creek were thinking about Christmas stockings in December, but not what they would find in their own. They were all about supplying them to the less fortunate.
Clockwise from bottom left: panellists Justin Sun, Kim Penner, Moses Falco, and host Aaron Epp.
“Why are you a Mennonite?”
That’s the question panellists were asked at the third instalment of Canadian Mennonite’s online discussion series. People on 47 different screens tuned into the Nov. 16 conversation, engaging in a lively back-and-forth with the speakers.
Young people from three Leamington Mennonite churches participate in the Junior Youth Converge event on Nov. 25. (Photo by Barry Bergen)
Like many of their peers in Mennonite Church Canada congregations, the youth pastors in Leamington were wondering how to react to declining Sunday school participation and overall shrinking numbers of youth in their churches.
Ed Willms, former executive director of the Ontario Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches.
Ed Willms had high hopes when he organized a Sept. 13 event for about 45 pastors and other leaders from the Ontario Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches (ONMB) to talk about LGBTQ+ welcome and inclusion.
MDS funds churches in Canada to be the hands and feet of Jesus. (MDS photo)
A Mennonite Church Eastern Canada congregation is among five Canadian churches that received grants this fall from the 2022-23 Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) Canada Spirit of MDS Fund. The purpose of the fund is to assist churches in Canada as they serve and support people in their communities.
Mark von Kampen, the Menno Office chaplain, and U of M student Andrew Enns at IMCA’s annual meeting. (Photo by Gladys Terichow)
After two years of online learning during the pandemic, Andrew Enns is finally experiencing in-person learning on the University of Manitoba campus.
Enns, a third-year student in the agriculture program, is now making new friends and reconnecting with former friends and acquaintances at the Menno Office.
Ethiopians gather to share meals and storytelling at Christmas. (Mennonite World Conference photo)
One of the most outstanding Christmas traditions among communities in Kenya is having vigils popularly know as “Kesha” on Christmas Eve. Most worshippers come together to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ by singing hymns and carols, and even at times recreate the holy event by nativity plays.
In the wake of Hockey Canada’s recent scandal, some Mennonites are re-thinking what it means to be a hockey fan. (Flickr photo by Brad Saunders)
Like other Canadians, many Mennonites watch or play hockey. But in the wake of Hockey Canada’s recent sexual-assault scandal, some Canadian Mennonites are considering what it means to be a Mennonite hockey fan. Opinions differ.
Religious make-up of Canadian population. (Pie chart by Betty Avery)
Every 10 years Stats Canada collects religious data. Recently, World Vision and WayBase—another Christian organization—partnered to distill the numbers related to changes in religion from 2011 to 2021. Here is a distillation of their distillation.
(Flickr photo by Lawrence OP)
In the Christian tradition, the story of Christmas is grounded in the truth that God took on human form and came to live among us. Isaiah 7:14 says: “Therefore, the Lord will give you a sign.
(Mennonite World Conference photo)
“We raise a cry of alarm to the different faithful members of the Mennonite church around the world,” writes Reverend Alphonse Kisubi Kassa, a leader of Communauté des Églises des Frères Mennonites au Congo (CEFMC).
CMU faculty David Balzer, a key figure in launching the radio-style show, has more than a decade of experience working in broadcast radio in Winnipeg. (Screenshot by Nicolien Klassen-Wiebe)
CMU faculty and staff: Karen Ridd, top left; Valerie Smith, top right; and Wendy Kroeker, bottom, are the hosts of ‘We Need to Talk: Voices of Nonviolent Resistance.’ (Screenshot by Nicolien Klassen-Wiebe)
When Russia invaded Ukraine in February, Karen Ridd was struck by how many people around her immediately called for military troops to be sent.
Andy Brubacher Kaethler teaches a graduate-level course at AMBS in June 2022. (Photo by Peter Ringenberg)
Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS) is now accepting applications for a new doctor of ministry degree—the first of its kind.
Present-day Old Bethlehem. (Photo by Byron and Melita Rempel-Burkholder)
Christian Palestinians have asked the global church to stand with them, and Mennonites in Canada have now asked their government to do the same.
This image—entitled “Before Grace”—and the one opposite—entitled “Endless Cycle”—tell of artist Lynda Toews’ experience growing up in a violent home. They were part of the exhibit, ‘Breaking the Silence on Domestic Abuse,’ at the Mennonite Heritage Centre Gallery a year ago. (Photo courtesy of Lynda Toews)
(Photo courtesy of Lynda Toews)
Research shows that rates of domestic abuse are just as prevalent in religious communities, and even higher in more conservative forms of religion, says Val Peters Hiebert, assistant coordinator of Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) Manitoba’s Abuse Response and Prevention Program, which helps congregations navigate disclosures of abuse and cases of sexual misconduct by clergy.
MDS volunteer Frank Guenther works on Johnny Parson’s house in Glace Bay, N.S. (Photo by John Longhurst)
As hurricanes go, Fiona wasn’t as bad as some when it hit Atlantic Canada—just lots of trees blown down into yards, and shingles and siding blown off houses.
Unless it was your tree, your yard or your roof and siding. Then it was a very big deal.
That’s how Nick Hamm sees it.
Jared Siebert, right, founder of the New Leaf Network, shares his story of encountering God in the failures of church planting, as Cindy Wallace of the Backyard Church in Saskatoon looks on.
In the current cultural climate, many churches, Mennonite ones included, are wrestling with the question of how to help members talk about faith and God’s work in their own lives. At a time when “evangelism” can seem almost like a four-letter word, how can people of faith bear witness to God’s movement in honest and authentic ways?
