Never forgotten or forsaken
When I was five years old, two forces shook my world to its core. Before this, I had a loving family, a good school and a beautiful country. But that year, 1960, thousands of Ethiopian troops invaded my country of Eritrea. A dark cloud of fear hung over the land and the people. People spoke…
Toews adaptation a poignant, honest look at grief
Toward the end of All My Puny Sorrows, Lottie (Mare Winningham) sits in her Toronto apartment comforting her sobbing daughter, Yoli (Alison Pill), noting, “The pain of letting go of grief is just as painful—even more painful—than the grief itself.” This sentiment colours the film’s entirety. At its core, the movie, based on Miriam Toews’s…
Biblical companions on my cancer journey
My family does cancer in a big way. In my immediate family of five members, there have been 10 occasions when a doctor told one of us that we have cancer, or that, despite the treatments, the cancer has returned. My wife Esther has had two rounds of breast cancer. Our son Tim, who was…
The joy connection
In 2013 I went on a pilgrimage to Scotland to explore my family roots and the “thin places” and sacred sites in the land of my ancestors. I arrived at the Glasgow airport shortly after 8 a.m. After landing, I immediately picked up my rental car and headed to my first destination. I hadn’t been…
Grief and a snowman
A few weeks ago, I received a package in the mail from the Boston Athletic Association for finishers of the Boston Marathon. It was exciting to receive the package and yet it was also quite sad. ‘It was exciting to receive the package and yet it was also quite sad.’ This was not how I…
Offering the gift of non-judgmental listening
Elaine Presnell has presided at around 600 funerals. That’s a number most pastors won’t achieve in a lifetime. But Presnell isn’t an ordinary pastor. For more than 10 years, she has worked for Mourning Glory Funeral Services in Saskatoon as a funeral officiant. Previously, she spent 16 years as a psychiatric nurse at Saskatoon’s Regional…
‘I should ask Dad’
“It was here somewhere,” I said to my son Allan. “The Boese canning factory was over here, and over there was an orchard where we lived in our trailer until about 1962. It was near the dormitory for the workers. At least I think. I should ask Dad.” (Dad was Peter Rogalsky. He and Leona…
coping grieving remembering
Holly (a pseudonym) began experiencing serial pregnancy loss several years ago, after the birth of her youngest son. In her mind, the words “church” and “support” don’t really go together. While she uses the word “Mennonite” nominally when necessary, she now practises what she calls her do-it-yourself religion, having given up on the idea of…
Small-town suicide
I wrote this story two years ago, and since then another suicide has occurred and been mourned, in a neighbouring community. That man I did know. To remember both of these men who left behind wives, children, even grandchildren, today I publish it. Let’s learn how to handle mental illness in the church in a…
Seeing the Other Side
How resilient are people? Do we really fall apart in every situation of grief? How is it that we can recover from horrendous trauma to life normal lives again? In his book The Other Side of Sadness, George A. Bonanno explores mourning and the nature of human resilience in the face of grief. He suggests…
