Every tribe and language
I expect everyone has forgotten what I had to say when I spoke at Rockway Mennonite Collegiate’s chapel a few years ago. But I know some remember that I asked students to read Scripture in their own languages. For a few international students it was the first time they heard the Bible read in their…
Is that not us?
I am pondering yet again the “Mennonite” label, and what it means for us today in Canada. There are three things that recently provoked these questions. First, Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) funded historical research on its historical relationship with Nazism. MCC is bravely facing new understandings of its own history. However, MCC’s connections to Nazism…
What will church look like?
Church is not the building. We’ve heard that often over the last 18 months. But now that some congregations are back in their building, with the rest trying to figure it out, I wonder who will come back? And what will we come back to? I have heard a variety of opinions around me, which…
Lament and love
Once again news headlines are about how the church has failed. News about residential schools fill our newsfeeds, schools generally run by churches and funded by the government, with decades of separating families and leaving wounds of trauma for seven generations. Mennonites want to know, “Were we involved?” (See 2010 CM article online at https://bit.ly/3gjm2uL.)…
A communion in communion
Where or when is the next Mennonite World Conference? This was the question posed to all of us as Mennonite World Conference (MWC) staff and volunteers at a recent Zoom gathering. Some people quickly figured out it was a trick question. The next MWC assembly will be in Indonesia in July 2022. But MWC is…
‘I shall not be moved’
Strong, hopeful and resilient. Are those words that describe you today, after a year of pandemic restrictions, with all the predictions of doom in regards to climate change, and ongoing evidence of systemic and individual racism directed against people of many colours in Canada? Are these words that you use to describe church in light…
Accountability
Jean Vanier. Ravi Zacharias. John Howard Yoder. We add to this list in our own Canadian Mennonite church community every year. My Lenten reading in March was from Matthew 23, where Jesus chastises faith leaders who do not practise what they teach and who tie heavy burdens on the shoulders of others. Our accompanying devotional…
Vaccine inequities
I struggle often with my relative wealth and privilege. Working with Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) for 20-plus years helped give me something “to do” to address inequities in our world. Working with Mennonite World Conference (MWC) makes me even more aware of the inequities of wealth and privilege, and how we might respond as the…
Connections
I believe it is important that we are called to belong to a faith community that is beyond our own congregation. My main question today is: “How do we belong, how do we connect with the people in our Anabaptist church (regional, nationwide, international) beyond our congregation? In previous decades, we learned about and developed…
Year of wonders
I read with great interest the many articles about how different churches are responding to the pandemic and government restrictions. There are many! Because there are many ways for churches to respond both to the pandemic and to the restrictions. I have divided the various Canadian responses into two broad strands in my mind, although…
