Willems statue commissioned for Manitoba museum
A peace exhibit committee has commissioned Manitoba sculptor Peter Sawatzky to build a bronze statue of martyred Anabaptist Dirk Willems. Based on an engraving of Willems, by Jan Luyken in Martyrs Mirror, the monument is intended to recognize the Anabaptist ideals of peacemaking. The life-size statue, to be completed in 2018, will be the focal…
Bluffton archivist tells story of Ephrata ‘Martyrs Mirror’
At Bluffton (Ohio) University’s Musselman Library, archivist Carrie Phillips stores seven copies of the 1748 edition of the Ephrata Martyrs Mirror in boxes specially designed to keep them preserved. But this year, Phillips had multiple opportunities to take the books off the shelf and showcase both their religious and historical significance during presentations on and…
Telling Anabaptist stories old and new
The two nights of the 2018 Bechtel Lectures at Conrad Grebel University College were connected by David Weaver-Zercher and focussed on Mennonite stories and how they are used in the media and elsewhere. The professor of American religious history at Messiah College in Mechanicsburg, Pa., is probably best known for explaining to the worldwide media…
Letter to the family: A mother’s treasure
Children are among the most important things given to us in our lives. With this gift comes the responsibility of passing on our faith. This can be a daunting task in a cultural climate that isn’t always friendly to followers of Jesus. The desire of our hearts Maeyken van Deventers expresses the desire of our…
A faith to die for
Martyrs Mirror is newer than the Bible and longer than some copies of it. Like the Bible, though, the book has a powerful message for today, said James Lowry, a Mennonite historian from Hagerstown, Md. “Persecution, dungeons, shackles, chains are not something in our experience,” Lowry told an audience at the June 8-10, 2010, “Martyrs…
