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The Mennonite church has the opportunity to become a dependable partner in the work of dismantling racism.
The church as a whole has a record of racism—both overt and covert—that has been attested to by generations of Black, Indigenous and people of colour (BIPOC) community members both within and outside the church.
A Black Lives Matter protest in Montreal, Que. this past June. (Photo by Ying Ge/Unsplash)
What follows is a companion piece to "White Mennonite static" by American scholar Tobin Miller Shearer.
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I’ve been embarrassed of my heritage for most of my life. I’m the son of immigrants who came from Germany and the Philippines. Even though I was born in Canada, I know that to many people, I look like I came from somewhere else.
That’s why I’ve always cringed when people ask me where I’m from. It’s never about where my home is but rather where my family came from. Saying “Canada” was never good enough, and that often made me feel like an outsider.
The Barkman family takes part in a rally in Manila on Feb. 24, 2018 to protest the police brutality of President Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs. (Photo courtesy of Christina Bartel Barkman)
I was in Whistler, B.C., last week with my husband and kids, and we joined a Black Lives Matter protest in the village. My eight-year-old reminded us that we used to do this often when we lived in Manila in the Philippines.
People dance at a Black Lives Matter protest in Washington, D.C. on June 6, 2020. (Photo by Clay Banks/Unsplash)
When I preach I often reference verses in the Bible that talk about God’s intention that all nations, languages and tribes are called to worship God through Jesus. The Book of Acts is the story of the Jewish disciples relying on the power of the Holy Spirit and learning that the new church is relevant to a world much bigger than they ever imagined.
(Image by S. Hermann & F. Richter/Pixabay)
As rallies and protests continue across the United States and Canada in response to the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers, the five regional churches of Mennonite Church Canada released a statement yesterday asking congregations to set a specific time of prayer this coming Sunday, June 7.
