Going to J-school: my walk of protest
The time has come. At the beginning of September, I began full-time journalism studies at the University of Regina. Our family moved back to Regina for this reason, and after a year of staying at home with our two young kids, I’ll be off studying for the majority of the week. I’ve gone through a…
Agonizing over the ‘best’ community?
My son will be starting Kindergarten in the fall. Along with feelings of excitement and uncertainty over seeing him go to school, and the adjustment it’ll mean for our family, actually choosing a school has been the hardest part. Here’s the situation: There’s a public school that’s a five-minute walk away. It has a very…
A justice-oriented church community
I haven’t been to the dump before. The route is unfamiliar. My father-in-law and I drive east, now on the outskirts of Regina, and eventually pass the oil refinery, a mammoth mess of tangled pipes behind a sea of parked trucks. As we pull up, I look upon the hills and see the plastic bags.…
Ripples and waves
On Feb. 27, 2016, I attended a talk given by Seth Klein, director of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives B.C., about The Leap Manifesto, an initiative out of the This Changes Everything movement begun by Naomi Klein and her book of the same name. The manifesto’s subtitle reads, “A call for a Canada based…
My resolution for 2016
I’ve written before about not driving to church and what this might mean for how we worship: planning a longer bike ride or walk each Sunday morning, trying out the church in our neighbourhood (even if it’s not Mennonite!). These are good ideas. But it’s time to go farther, which is why, this month, my…
Ready to listen and learn
My memories of the church I grew up in are good ones. I liked seeing my friends in Sunday school every week and enjoyed singing in the grown-up service. The Halloween game nights, Christmas musicals and Vacation Bible Schools (VBS) were fun. They were also opportunities—at least the musicals and VBS—for people to accept Jesus…
Staying put
My family and I moved from Vancouver to Regina in July and are slowly searching for a faith community. So far we’ve attended two churches close to where we live, and with which we would feel comfortable, theologically. When we arrived (late) at both services, the first thing I noticed was that there were mostly…
Winds of change
In a couple weeks, my family and I will move to my hometown, Regina, where I’ll start school next fall. Maybe it’s because I’m in a time of transition in my personal life—books packed up, clothes and toys in boxes, cleaning buckets everywhere—but I’m sensitive to winds of change around me. It started with our…
A different kind of disaster
My family and I often walk through the old-growth forests that surround the University of British Columbia (UBC) campus and then down to the waters of English Bay. There is lots to look for along the way: pileated woodpeckers and black-capped chickadees in the trees, slugs on the trails, and, when we get to the…
A case for neighbourly love
I’m in the thick of it. I had my second child earlier this year and life is still in the process of reordering itself. The predictable schedule went out the window and is slowly settling back into something new and, well, busy. Finding time to keep up with everyday tasks—dishes, laundry, meal prep—is difficult. Babies…
