Ecumenical friendship calls for solidarity with ancient Christian communities in Middle East

Christians gather for Evening Prayer outside St. Joseph’s Church in Erbil. (photo: Don Duncan, CNEWA)

Ecumenical friendship is not only about theological dialogue and common causes–it is also about solidarity in suffering, our calling to “bear one another’s burdens” in the body of Christ so that we might “fulfill the law of Christ” (Gal 6:2). The Catholic Near East Welfare Agency (CNEWA) is a Vatican agency that provides humanitarian and pastoral support for the Eastern Catholic churches. CNEWA works in Eastern Europe, Northeast Africa and throughout the Middle East. A key area of CNEWAs work has been supporting seminaries and training catechists in some of the oldest Christian communities that are struggling to survive in challenging conditions.

This year the church marks Advent and Christmas while many thousands of Catholic Christians have been displaced by expanding war in northern Iraq. They are waiting and wondering whether they will ever be able to return home. Their story is told in an article titled “Exodus” in the magazine ONE, published by CNEWA. Here’s a brief sample:

At night, above this landscape of abjection reigns a scattering of glimmering crosses. On the feast of the Triumph of the Cross, celebrated on 14 September, Iraqi Christians erect illuminated crosses on top of their buildings and leave them there for several weeks. The crosses they left behind in Qaraqosh and Bartella have most likely been taken down or destroyed, but crosses seem to have redoubled across the recently overpopulated Christian enclaves of Iraqi Kurdistan.

While the presence of the crosses certainly brings hope to the faithful, the harsh reality grinds on: It has been months since their expulsion and they are still languishing in churches, tents, abandoned basements, unfinished buildings, repurposed schools and social centers.”

For the full story click here

The mentally ill are our lepers

In a March 28 article in National Catholic Reporter, Melissa Musick Nussbaum compares the lepers healed by Jesus, previously ostracized as “unclean,” to patients of mental health facilities today. She writes:

I serve on the board of my local Catholic Charities. Our Marian House Soup Kitchen and drop-in center is located downtown, just across the street from the cathedral. Many of those we serve are mentally ill. Every year the cry goes up to move the facility to some place far away from downtown shops and restaurants. Every year the cry goes up to relocate our Lazaruses so that our way is unhindered, our view is unspoiled, and our fantasies remain intact.

So I’ve been interested in Dr. [Abraham] Nussbaum’s work, a work he does with many others of like mind, to find a different way to treat and live with the mentally ill. His attention is drawn to the many Mennonites, who, as conscientious objectors during World War II, worked as attendants in American mental asylums.

Menno Simons, the Anabaptist father of the Mennonites, was a Norbertine priest before he left the order and the Catholic church. But Nussbaum believes that Simons, and his followers, may help lead the church back into right relationship with our brothers and sisters who suffer from mental illness.

Nussbaum goes on to outline a history of the Mennonite conscientious objectors who completed their Civilian Public Service in psychiatric hospitals, refusing to use any force against patients. She concludes with a vision for what service to the mentally ill could look like in a Catholic context. The full article is available here.

Timothy Colegrove: Pope Francis on “Slow” Evangelism

Mennonite church planter Timothy Colegrove, in a recent entry on Patheos’ Slow Church blog, reflects on Pope Francis’ engaging and relational approach to spreading the gospel, and how this meshes with the “Slow Church” concept. Giving particular attention to Francis’ apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, Colegrove muses:

As Alice and I move forward in our mission to plant a church with the Conservative Mennonite Conference in Boston, I find myself in strange unity with the Pope. Who would have imagined that a Mennonite would find such agreement with the head of the Catholic Church, an institution that viciously oppressed early Anabaptist disciples? Yet while reading the Evangelii, I could feel my heart breaking out in applause and spirit-filled agreement at his call to greater connection with other disciples and with the communities around us. Undoubtedly this is the Church that a relationally starved culture needs so badly.

The full article is available here.

Susan Kennel Harrison: True dialogue doesn’t allow you to give up your distinct beliefs

Susan Kennel Harrison, former Bridgefolk Board member, recently offered the following reflection on the nature of interfaith dialogue on the blog site State of Formation.

To be “good” at Interfaith dialogue you need to first know the beliefs of your religious tradition, more precisely than your average practitioner, “the faithful.” You not only need to know the beliefs of your religious tradition but why it holds those specific beliefs. You also need to know how those of other denominations of your religious tradition might believe differently, and why; the nuances of where/why your part of the same tradition might not agree with them doctrinally or where you vary in practice. Continue reading “Susan Kennel Harrison: True dialogue doesn’t allow you to give up your distinct beliefs” →

Pax Christi and the gospel of peace – “Making the case for the abolition of war”

Reflection from Pax Christi USA, December 17, 2013

by Scott Wright, Pax Christi Metro D.C.-Baltimore

Part of the title (in quotes) is borrowed from an essay by Stanley Hauerwas, a moral theologian who was deeply influenced by the late Mennonite theologian John Howard Yoder, both of whom taught at Notre Dame.[1] The title is challenging, but we cannot deny that our deepest longings and aspirations move us toward this goal for peace. In fact, the abolition of war forms the opening of the United Nations Charter: “We, the people of the United Nations, [are] determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war… and to live in peace with one another as good neighbors…” The times require great moral imagination, and great moral courage.

Particularly when we look at the state of the world today, and begin to measure our humble efforts for peace against such a stark reality of war and violence, we tend to get discouraged, and may be tempted to give up hope in ever seeing the day when war is finally abolished. Yet history is full of surprises. Who could have predicted that non-violent movements for democracy would usher in the end of the Cold War, or that dialogue between arch-enemies in South Africa would lead to the end of apartheid?

Surely, others before us were discouraged and tempted to lose hope; for instance, in the long struggle to abolish slavery and torture. Why should the struggle to abolish war be any different? We know that slavery continues to exist even today, and it is a very serious problem. Torture, too, continues to be practiced, as we know very well from the pictures and stories that have been broadcast to the world from Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Still, it was a very significant step to abolish the moral and legal justifications for both slavery and torture; and it would be a very significant step to do the same regarding the practice of war.

I believe there are good grounds for hope in this struggle to finally abolish war. The witness of the Mennonites and other peace churches over the past several centuries is a reason for hope. The teachings of the Catholic Church since the Second Vatican Council give rise to hope, particularly the eloquent and urgent pleas of the popes, from Paul VI’s impassioned plea to the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1965: “Never again war! No, never again war!”[2] to John Paul II’s repetition of that plea in his encyclical Centesimus Annus in 1991,[3] and later his Jubilee message on the World Day of Peace in 2000: “War is a defeat for humanity!”[4] And finally today, Pope Francis’ words opposing war during an evening prayer service for Syria in St. Peter’s Square:

“How many conflicts, how many wars have mocked our history?” he asked the faithful. “Even today we raise our hand against our brother…We have perfected our weapons, our conscience has fallen asleep, and we have sharpened our ideas to justify ourselves as if it were normal we continue to sow destruction, pain, death. Violence and war lead only to death.”

In each of these instances, we find a step in the conversion of the Catholic Church toward becoming an authentic peace church, rooted in the Gospel of peace and the passion, death and resurrection of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. This change of emphasis in the Catholic Church is marked by an increased use of the just war theory to restrain and oppose modern warfare, rather than to justify it, and a “seismic shift”[5] to nonviolence as a public witness for peace, both key elements in making the case for the final abolition of war.

Continue reading “Pax Christi and the gospel of peace – “Making the case for the abolition of war”” →

The Christmas story’s “whisper from the edges”

Australian Mennonite Clair Hochstetler, in a reflection for the news service Mennolink, comments appreciatively on Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, as cited in an article from the Jesuit website Eureka Street.

Hochstetler writes,

“The Christmas story is a whisper from the edges that another kind of world is possible…. Continue reading “The Christmas story’s “whisper from the edges”” →

Pax Christi: Dialogue is the only way towards an end of the violence in Syria

Catholic peace organization Pax Christi has issued the following statement:

Pax Christi International is deeply concerned about the latest events in Syria.

While we unequivocally condemn the use of chemical weapons, regardless of who perpetrated the attack, Pax Christi pleads with the nations of the world to recognize the responsibility and authority of the UN Security Council to address this egregious violation of international law and morality and to work with the United Nations to protect – without escalating the violence – the Syrian people. This should be done through urgent diplomatic efforts to stop immediately the flow of arms to both sides and to all militant groups and to bring all stakeholders in the conflict to the negotiating table. Many states have helped fuel the armed conflict in Syria by sending weapons to the region; now it is time for the International community to cooperate fully on an arms embargo and to unequivocally back dialogue that alone can end the horrific violence.

Continue reading “Pax Christi: Dialogue is the only way towards an end of the violence in Syria” →

John Dear describes his experience at a Catholic Worker house in California, quotes Mennonite volunteer

In a two-part series on National Catholic Reporter, John Dear, SJ writes about his current experience as a short-term volunteer at Kelly Avenue Catholic Worker house in Half Moon Bay, California.

In part one (available in full here), Dear quotes Mennonite volunteer Katerina Friesen as she explains what motivates her involvement there:

I came to the Catholic Worker because, as a follower of Jesus, I wanted to learn how to live a different way of life…. The Catholic Worker tradition of resisting war and serving the poor made sense to me, and it’s turned out to be a really liberating experience. Now, when I see a homeless person, I feel free to talk with him or her, to ask what they need rather than walking past or feeling afraid. And I used to be bound by anxiety about my life, but now I see how my needs are taken care of even as I help care for other people’s needs. Continue reading “John Dear describes his experience at a Catholic Worker house in California, quotes Mennonite volunteer” →

Ivan Kauffman: Pope Francis and peace

Bridgefolk perspectives on Pope Francis

For the past half-century, ever since John XXIII and Vatican II, the popes have been strong advocates of peace. Since John Paul II they have been non-Italians. And beginning with John Paul they have been increasingly attractive to the evangelical community. If early indications endure, this trend will continue under Pope Francis—and if so it will be strengthened, and likely become permanent. This has profound and long-lasting significance for the Mennonite-Catholic reconciliation in which Bridgefolk has played an important role.

This is very good news, but it also comes with a price. A pope from Argentina inevitably brings the legacy of that nation’s “Dirty War” with him—and with it the Churches’ inaction during the reign of terror and state-sanctioned murder, which impacted all the Americas, including the United States in that period. Along with the gift of this attractive new papacy we must now confront our unwillingness and our inability to deal with this great mass of political evil.

In his final speech before being elected pope and choosing the name Francis, Cardinal Bergoglio told his fellow cardinals he heard Jesus knocking at the door, but that he heard Jesus knocking from inside the Church, asking to be let out into the world. It is widely believed this speech played a major role in his election. Belonging to a Church which goes out with Christ into the world’s evil and suffering will be a very different experience for most of us. It will require not only personal and political change, it will require some new institutions. But this is an opportunity, not a burden, and it is one that both Catholics and Mennonites can enthusiastically embrace. Let us do so.

Ivan J. Kaufman is a co-founder of the Bridgefolk movement.