Hurricane Dorian: MDS is “ready to respond”
As Americans follow updates about Hurricane Dorian, Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) Canada is keeping an eye on the storm, too. The organization, which rebuilds and repairs homes destroyed or damaged by natural disasters in the U.S. and Canada, is “ready to respond” when the storm is over says Ross Penner, executive director of MDS Canada.…
‘The hands and feet of Jesus’
This year, Mennonite Voluntary Service (MVS) is celebrating 75 years of placing young adults in service positions across Canada and the U.S. About 20 years ago, when the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Mennonite Church merged and became Mennonite Church Canada and MC U.S.A., they planned to have separate service programs owned by each…
A bouncer for Jesus
So how did a 22-year-old Mennonite from France end up volunteering on the streets of Lethbridge as a bouncer for Jesus? Even he’s not sure, but he’s loving it, and when he returns to France in September, he plans to continue working with street people if he can find an opportunity. Simon Crelerot, a volunteer…
Resurrection hopes for a once-shared ministry
Kansas was not an exotic place to hold annual orientations for Mennonite Voluntary Service (MVS). Yet when MVS was a shared U.S.-Canada program, Brad Reimer and Miles Reimer, two of its leaders living on opposite sides of the 49th parallel, considered the gathering a highlight. Miles, MVS’s director for the American side from 1996 through…
Learning to be grateful
When Claudia Dueck thinks back on the voluntary service she did in Paraguay earlier this year, it’s the Tuesdays that stick out the most. Dueck, 19, spent three months volunteering at Kilometre 81, a Mennonite hospital in eastern Paraguay that treats people with leprosy, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS. Every Tuesday evening, Dueck and the other volunteers…
