(Photo by Jon Tyson/Unsplash)
I am in favour of talking about faith in Jesus. I especially like to do so with those who do not hold to that faith. Some call that “evangelism” and use it as a dirty word. We all know great abuses have occurred doing evangelism. Still, I am in favour of it. I even want to talk about conversion.
(Photo by Jon Tyson/Unsplash)
For a few years now, I have felt good about my slow but steady pace of reading reflectively through Scripture. It is a spiritual discipline I’ve moulded in a way that works for me. Prayer, however, is one that, although certainly not absent from my life, could use some work.
(Graphic by Betty Avery)
Thanks offered for ‘defunding police’ feature
Re: “Defund the police?” feature, Sept. 27, 2021, page 4.
The 14-point silver star under the main altar in the Grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem marks the spot where, according to tradition, Jesus Christ was born.
It was a lifelong dream coming true. In a crowded stairwell I inched toward what we had all come to see. Down in the basement, below street level, the room smelled of the smoke from oil lamps dangling precariously overhead, the very place, according to tradition, where Jesus Christ was born. I was in the Grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem.
(Photo: Mennonite Heritage Archives)
Problems with dancing have been discussed at numerous times in many church settings. On July 3, 1951, the Northwest Mennonite Conference delegates discussed the Alberta education system that offered lessons in various types of dancing. Delegates approved a resolution that read: “Such teaching encourages the sensuality of our age.
(Photo by Hello I'm Nik/Unsplash)
As we move into 2022, many of us look back at our experience of church last year with dismay and we look forward with hope. Or do you look back with longing, and forward with dismay? Might we look both back and forward with hope?
(Photo by Lili Kovac/Unsplash)
I’ve never seen mist move in so quickly. A multitude of mysterious wisps just appeared out of nowhere, advancing swiftly across the rolling hills before me like an army of ghosts. It was stunning, haunting, beautiful.
(Photo by Miguel Bruna/Unsplash)
Yet again, I read last month about another pastor, an Anabaptist leader at that, being accused of sexual misconduct. It was Bruxy Cavey, pastor of The Meeting House, a Be in Christ megachurch. I thought to myself: “yet again.”
(istock.com photo by doidam10)
In warmer months, a circle of seven or so adults gathers in my backyard on Sunday afternoons. We earnestly discuss Scripture, share the highs and lows of our lives, ask what God may be saying to us this afternoon. We pray. We pass bread and glasses of grape juice. Sometimes we even sing.
Dear Peter, Dear Ulla, book cover
Barbara Nickel has done something very clever with her book Dear Peter, Dear Ulla.
(flickr.com photo by Cereal_girl)
The recent floods in southern British Columbia have wreaked havoc in many ways, devastating towns and roads, and deeply impacting communities.
(Graphic by Betty Avery)
A very big community of not-very-close friends
Re: “Weak ties matter,” Sept. 27, page 11.
An aerial view of Camp Assiniboia. (Photo courtesy of Facebook.com/campswithmeanin)
In 2015, some of the summer staff at Mennonite Church Manitoba’s Camps with Meaning wrote a song called “This Ground.” The song makes the simple observation that nature inspires us to pray. It encourages us to notice the beauty of creation all around us, hinting that there’s much to learn about God in the natural world.
(Photo: Mennonite Heritage Archives / John P. Dyck Photo Collection)
Alternative service camps during the Second World War brought young men from various traditions and regions together. Pictured, Reverend David P. Reimer of Manitoba, centre, is posing with conscientious objectors in Seebe, Alta.
(Photo by flo222/Pixabay)
I was driving the night shift that week, hauling wood chips to the pulp mill in The Pas, Man.
I pulled into the Esso C-Store in Nipawin, Sask., a little after 11 p.m., closing time. As I filled my mug, I apologized for keeping the clerk around so late.
“Oh, no,” he assured me. “The fair closes tonight, so we’re staying open till midnight to catch the traffic going home.”
(Photo by Elisabeth Wales/Unsplash)
A reader who comes from outside the religious community asked what I meant by the term “flourishing” when I used it last month. I had written that God desires the flourishing of all peoples, especially the marginalized of our global world.
(Photo by Niklas Ohlrogge/Unsplash)
In Dr. Seuss’s book Oh the Places You’ll Go there is a section about “the waiting place.” It is depicted as an undesirable and useless place to be. I wonder if our Advent waiting sometimes feels like that kind of waiting. I wrote a little poem in the style of Dr. Seuss about Advent waiting:
They can be necessary, but they are usually devastating. Church splits, in my experience, are not often talked about in Christian circles, yet they are not uncommon.
Church splits are necessary for many different reasons, including:
(Graphic by Betty Avery)
‘We are in a climate emergency’: MC Canada
Mennonite Church Canada leaders released the following statement on Nov. 4 during the COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow, Scotland:
(Photo by Lawrence Aritao/Unsplash)
The last time my in-laws came north to visit, they brought us a broken electric kettle. We had gifted it to them at a long-ago Christmas. Now, years later, it stopped working. It was under warranty, but that only applied in Canada. With repair, it could function and stay out of the landfill.
Photo: The Canadian Mennonite / Mennonite Archives of Ontario
Herb Wiebe, facing camera, visits with an inmate at the Oakalla Prison Farm in Burnaby, B.C., in 1970. A growing number of British Columbia Mennonite men volunteered to befriend inmates through the M-2 (Man to Man) program, a prison visitation program then in its early days in Canada.
(Photo by Amador Loureiro/Unsplash)
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 mother tongue. That has not been forgotten.
(Photo by Karl Fredrickson/Unsplash)
After a month in the woods by myself, my sabbatical plan is to spend three months listening to people who aren’t a part of church culture, to see how they view church and understand why they don’t go to church.
(Graphic by Betty Avery)
Readers respond to ‘living simply’
Re: “What is enough?” Sept. 13, page 11.
(Photo by Kyle Glenn/Unsplash)
I remember a conversation with my mom when I was a child.
“Why is there a Mother’s Day and a Father’s Day, but no Children’s Day?” I asked.
My mom’s answer was rather predictable, “Every day is Children’s Day!”
