Tag: Christian community

  • Can’t we all just get along?

    Can’t we all just get along?

    Are you losing hope in the possibility of everyone getting along? Division in the church is nothing new for me. I grew up in a harsh, conservative fundamentalist church that judged everybody. Especially liberal Christians. In my early 20s, I became agnostic and relentlessly judgmental toward conservative Christians. I returned to Christian faith and church…

  • Sharing life with your tribe

    Sharing life with your tribe

    In 2013, I embarked on an ancestral pilgrimage to Scotland. The first site I visited was Lochmaben Castle, where, according to my Aunt Faye’s genealogical research, one of our ancestors was born.  Lochmaben Castle was a major defensive stronghold for both the Scottish and the English through the 13th to 17th centuries. Possession of the…

  • Solitude and community

    Solitude and community

    A peculiar thing happened to me last Sunday while I was on holidays. I felt a strong desire to attend a church service. Curious, to say the least. You see, by the time summer arrives, I’m usually churched out. As a pastor, church is not only my work life but a significant part of my…

  • Forming intentional community with young adults

    Forming intentional community with young adults

    When Thomas and Terri Lynn Friesen met, Terri Lynn was a guest at the Burrow, an intentional community Thomas was living in with eight other young adults. This coming September, a few weeks before the couple’s second wedding anniversary, they will embark on a new adventure together: opening their Saskatoon home to form an intentional…

  • Gifts of the table

    Gifts of the table

      Recently, my husband and I sat with friends at a table in an Ethiopian restaurant. As we dipped pieces of injera (sourdough flatbread) into the tasty sauces, we reported on our lives: a new business, a new grandchild, past school experiences, current professional realities. Consider what happens when people gather around the table: We…

  • Getting back to the garden

    Getting back to the garden

    Nestled in the bend of the Brokenhead River at the very end of a country road is a small Christian community trying to live responsibly and faithfully. Four family units are shareholders of this 58-hectare piece of land that was formerly a commercial strawberry farm.  Ploughshares Community Farm was incorporated in 2006, one of the…