Category: Features

Surprised by joy: a personal story of Advent

by Darrin W. Snyder Belousek
The Mennonite, December 2011

My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior… For the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.—Luke 1:46-49

This is Mary’s great song of praise to God. Mary sings with joy because she has been surprised by God—“he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.” Mary has been favored by God’s grace in a personal, intimate way—she is blessed with a child, God’s own Son—and she sings with joy in thanksgiving for this wonderful thing God is doing.

Like Mary, I love to sing—and to sing with joy. (Though I doubt I will ever be called “blessed” on account of my singing.) And I sing with joy because I, too, have known the surprising grace of God in a personal, intimate way.

Although I have loved to sing since childhood, I have not always sung with joy. For several years during my 20s there was no joy. I was one of those who “sit in darkness” beneath the shadow of fear, waiting for the Lord, watching for “the dawn from on high to break” (Psalm 130:5-6; Luke 1:78-79). Having wandered from the church, I was walking the shadowy vale alone. Continue reading “Surprised by joy: a personal story of Advent” →

Mennonite nuns?

This might be old news for a few Mennonites involved in Bridgefolk, but since they’ve never spoken up, it will be new news to others:

Anabaptist and Mennonite churches have long had deaconesses.  But only a few years ago, well into the 20th century, the practice took a form that looks very much like a Catholic religious order, according to the Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online:

By the 1950s 62 sisters had become members of the Bethel Deaconess sisterhood, 26 of whom were associated with the sisterhood in 1955. The deaconesses of this institution wore a special garb and were ordained by the church. Each sister had her place in the mother house, received full maintenance, a monthly allowance, an annual vacation, and a vacation allowance. She was expected to remain loyal and faithful to her calling but did not take an oath of celibacy. Should a deaconess change her mind, believing it to be God’s will that she serve in some other sphere apart from the sisterhood, she presented her resignation and received an honorable discharge.

We thought you’d want to know!

For source and additional information see:

Neff, Christian and Lena Mae Smith. “Deaconess.” Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. 1956. Web.  http://www.gameo.org/encyclopedia/contents/deaconess.

Introducing César García, in-coming MWC General Secretary

Mennonite World Conference 
news release

By Kathy Heinrichs Wiest

As one amateur Mennonite historian likes to point out, the only real Mennonite name is Menno Simons. From there on down through history, the rest of the family names are just “add-ons.” After a series of Mennonite World Conference (MWC) secretaries named Dyck (1961-73), Kraybill (1973-90) and Miller (1990-2011) the name of García stands out as an historically recent addition to the Anabaptist family.

César García’s personal story with the Mennonite family began in Bogotá, Colombia, when his mother took him and his sister to several churches in search of a new church home. Eleven-year-old César chose the Iglesia Hermanos Menonitas Dios es Amor (God is Love Mennonite Brethren Church) as the place they would settle.

That choice was the first step on a continuing journey for García, who has come to treasure Anabaptist theology and history and has given his life to scholarship, to mission and to shaping the church from an Anabaptist perspective. Continue reading “Introducing César García, in-coming MWC General Secretary” →

Woman’s journey from Mennonite to Catholic is a two-way street

Bridgefolk brings 2 churches together for dialog, worship

Dorothy Harnish

Dorothy Harnish is one of the local organizers for this year’s Bridgefolk conference in Akron, Pennsylvania.  A local paper in Lancaster did the following feature story on her:

By JOAN KERN
Correspondent
Lancaster Intelligencer-Journal / New Era

Dorothy Harnish was a cradle Mennonite. And a teen Mennonite and a young adult Mennonite and a middle-aged Mennonite.

But now she’s a senior citizen Catholic, a member of Lancaster’s St. Leo the Great Catholic Church.

Harnish, 69, of Landisville, will gather with about 75 other Catholics and Mennonites at the 11th annual Bridgefolk Conference, Thursday through Sunday, Aug. 7. Continue reading “Woman’s journey from Mennonite to Catholic is a two-way street” →

Receiving grace through countercultural footwashing

By Brian Miller
Mennonite Weekly Review
April 21, 2011

There’s no way around it — washing someone’s feet can be a bit awkward, especially if you are newer to this practice. In a day of vibey church cafes and artsy gathering spaces with sofas and technological whatsits, in a day when every attempt is made to make church appealing to the “spiritual but not religious,” in this day, we gather once again to practice footwashing.

But why? What compels us to continue this practice? Continue reading “Receiving grace through countercultural footwashing” →

Praying the Bridgefolk prayer – 10 years and counting

Ten years ago this week, a small group of original Bridgefolk participants and leaders met together to talk, pray and discern.  How should we follow through on our initial meeting in Pennsylvania in 1999?  What kind of community are we becoming?  How will participants know if they are “members?”  Should we have a common discipline of prayer, the way religious orders do?  What will bind our life together when we depart?  It would be good to at least have a common prayer that would resonate equally with Mennonites and Catholics, they decided, but what might that be?

In the middle of the night, one of Bridgefolk’s co-founders found the following prayer taking shape, got up, and wrote it down.  When he shared it with the others the next day, the group embraced it as a simple answer to many of our questions:

  • If someone can pray this prayer with all their heart, he or she is Bridgefolk.
  • Our rule would be to pray this prayer daily, and live accordingly.

On this 10th anniversary of the Bridgefolk prayer, therefore, we invite you to pray our common prayer today, to make or renew your commitment to pray it daily, and to live out the groanings we share for a Church of unity, nonviolence, and faithfulness to our Lord Jesus Christ. Continue reading “Praying the Bridgefolk prayer – 10 years and counting” →