Bridgefolk is a movement of sacramentally-minded Mennonites and peace-minded Roman Catholics who come together to celebrate each other's traditions, explore each other's practices, and honor each other's contribution to the mission of Christ's Church.
2025: Remembering Zurich and Nicaea January 27, 8-9:30 p.m. ET
Jennifer Otto, Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Lethbridge and Bridgefolk board member.
The year 2025 marks 500 years since the first adult believers’ baptisms of the Anabaptist movement took place in Zurich, Switzerland. It also marks 1700 years since the Council of Nicaea, where the Nicene Creed was established as the first ecumenical statement of “catholic” Christian faith. In this webinar, Bridgefolk Board Member Jennifer Otto, Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Lethbridge, will provide a brief historical introduction to the events of both Nicaea and Zurich and invite us into conversation about unity and division within the Church.
How should we, as Mennonites and as Catholics, commemorate these two events?
How do these anniversaries impact the way we think about “proceeding in friendship” together?
Can we celebrate the Nicene Creed and the beginnings of Anabaptism while acknowledging the pain caused by the ruptures in the Body of Christ that both events embody?
On October 10, a week into this year’s groundbreaking synod at the Vatican bringing bishops, other clergy, and laypeople together for a month of listening and discernment, the daily press conference focused on ecumenical dimensions of the event. Among four panelists from varying Christian traditions was Anne-Cathy Graber, a French Mennonite representing Mennonite World Conference. The following are excerpts from a Vatican News press release reporting on the briefing:
Anne-Cathy Graber speaks at Vatican press conference, 10 October 2024.
Reverend Anne-Cathy Graber, a pastor from the Mennonite World Conference and secretary for ecumenical relations, who is participating in the Synod for the first time, said she was “surprised by the invitation,” as she belongs to a “little-known church” that emerged from the Reformation in the 16th century and is characterized by the baptism of believers and active nonviolence.
Reflecting on her presence, she observed: “The Catholic Church does not need our voice, which is very small, but this in itself says much about synodality – it shows that every voice matters, every voice is important.”
For Pastor Graber, “Christian unity is not only a promise for tomorrow, it is here and now, and we can already see it. We are not only close but belong to the same body of Christ, we are members of one another, as St. Paul said.”
“Even though we do not have voting rights as fraternal delegates, “our voice and presence were welcomed just like everyone else’s. The equal dignity of baptism is visible. There is no powerful Church dominating from above. We are all a people walking together and seeking,” she continued.
Other panelists noted the close link between the “synodality” by which Catholics are working to better listen to one another, and ecumenical listening between Christians:
Voice was then given to the guests at the briefing, who focused on ecumenism, which forms an inseparable pair with synodality.
Cardinal Kurt Koch, Prefect of the [Vatican’s] Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, summed up the concept with these words: “The synodal journey is ecumenical. And the ecumenical journey cannot be anything but synodal.”
Defining the ecumenical dimension as “one of the most relevant aspects of this Synod,” the cardinal emphasized how fundamental “the exchange of gifts, in which we learn from one another, with the conviction that no Church is so rich that it does not need the contribution of other Churches, and no Church is so poor that it has nothing to offer” is to both ecumenism and synodality.
At an ecumenical Taize service the following day, Pope Francis himself underscored this message in a homily emphasizing the “common mission” of Christians around the world. Francis noted that “The ecumenical movement evolved from the desire to bear common witness: to witness alongside one another, not standing apart from or, worse yet, at odds with one another.”
To read the entire Vatican News press release from 10 October, click here.
For Pope Francis’s homily at the 11 October ecumenical Taize service, click here.
For a report on the synod and Graber’s participation in Anabaptist World, click here.
The second and final session of the Vatican Synod on Synodality will include a Mennonite representative and underline the Catholic Church’s plan to promote dialogue with other Christian denominations, enhance transparency and take responsibility for mistakes.
The number of representatives from other Christian denominations at the synod has grown from 12 to 16 to include Mennonite World Conference, the World Lutheran Federation, the Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch and the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria.
The Oct. 3-27 gathering at the Vatican will include MWC representative Anne-Cathy Graber of France, a member of MWC’s Faith nd Life Commission and MWC’s representative to the Global Christian Forum. She is a Mennonite but also a member of the Chemin Neuf Catholic community in Paris.
The World Conference on Faith and Order in 2025 (Alexandria, Egypt) will mark the 1700th anniversary of the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea under the theme “Where Now for Visible Unity?” International ecclesial dialogues seeking ecumenical convergence as a step towards visible unity have generally focused on issues of a doctrinal nature, paying little attention to the role of “experience” and, more specifically, “experiences of unity” in and between churches.
Larry Miller, former Secretary of Global Christian Forum and General Secretary of Mennonite World Conference.
Is this pattern beginning to change, thanks in particular to the globalization and the “pentecostalization” of the churches, as well as initiatives for ecclesial “reconciliation”?
In this Figel Event on Ecumenical Dialogue, Rev. Dr. Larry Miller, first full-time Secretary of the Global Christian Forum, and former General Secretary of the Mennonite World Conference, will receive the Consortium’s Ecumenism Award for 2024. Dr. Miller will address how experience and reconciliation between the churches is reshaping our understanding of Christian unity. He will draw upon responses to the Faith and Order Commission’s text “The Church: Towards a Common Vision,” conversations in the annual meeting of the Conference of Secretaries of Christian World Communions, encounters in the life of the Global Christian Forum, and the results of the international Lutheran-Mennonite reconciliation process.
Writing in Anabaptist World, the denominational magazine of the Mennonite Church USA, leading Mennonite historian John D. Roth has called upon Mennonites to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the Anabaptist movement that birthed their church in a spirit of reconciliation and forgiveness. Ecumenical “steps toward reconciliation in the past two decades” with Lutherans, Catholics, and Reformed churches “make it clear that the commemorative events … will need to look different” from the way that Mennonites once presented themselves in ecumenical encounters.
For example, if earlier accounts of Anabaptist beginnings depicted the movement primarily in heroic, even triumphalist, language, the 2025 commemoration will need to include space for confession. For many Mennonites our impulse in ecumenical settings is to claim our distinctive theological themes — community, discipleship, nonresistance — as if they were talismans that secure our moral superiority. The principle of “right remembering” calls us to also recognize shadow sides of those distinctives — the way in which our focus on distinctives can blind us to other theological truths — or to the gaps that exist between our precepts and our practice.
Second, a focus on Anabaptist origins in 16th-century Europe can easily overshadow the global reality of the church today. History matters, but almost all of the growth in MWC-member churches during the past 50 years has been in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The renewal of the Anabaptist tradition today is happening in the Global South.
Finally, our commemorations in 2025 will need to acknowledge the significant ecumenical relationships forged since 2004. These have spiritual significance and call on Mennonites to revise how we tell the story of the 16th century.
Roth is professor of history at Goshen (Ind.) College, director of the Institute for the Study of Global Anabaptism and editor of Mennonite Quarterly Review. His article is available in the March issue of Anabaptist World.
“This miracle will be one of the bridges between Roman Catholics and Mennonites in an ecumenical point of view,” said Pope John Paul II in 2003 on the occasion of the canonization of Joseph Freinademetz, S.V.D. He was speaking of the miraculous healing of Jun Yamada, son of a Japanese Mennonite pastor, through the joint intercessions of Catholics and Mennonites united by faith in Jesus and love of God. That miracle, as John Paul predicted, has inspired ongoing ecumenical friendships, dialogues, and engagements between Mennonite and Catholics, leading to this volume. Moved by this healing story, Bridgefolk, a Mennonite-Catholic ecumenical movement in North America, centered its annual conference in 2015 on that story. Following that conference, the Mennonite Catholic Theological Colloquium convened in 2016 to consider the Christian practice of intercessory prayer and doctrine of the communion of saints from the perspectives of both traditions. This volume collects the presentations from those two events, including the personal and theological reflections of Nozomu Yamada, brother of Jun, and Alfonso Fausone, S.V.D., who initiated the intercessions for Jun.
Praise for Intercessory Prayer and the Communion of Saints
“In a culture where the “praying hands” emoji is nearly ubiquitous, this mind-blowing collection—narratives surrounding an amazing healing and carefully articulated theological reflection—is a must read, whether or not we have an established prayer practice. Here we are offered the fruit of decades of Mennonite-Roman Catholic conversation. And although the volume does not directly address this, Intercessory Prayer reminds Euro-American Anabaptist descendants of rich and faithful insights blossoming among siblings in Christ in other cultures.”
—Nancy R. Heisey, Professor at Eastern Mennonite Seminary and Past-President of Mennonite World Conference
“This book constitutes an excellent contribution to what was once thought to be church-dividing and off limits: the communion of Saints and intercessory prayer. While written as part of Mennonite-Catholic dialogue, and not least, stemming from the ecumenical conversations of Bridgefolk, this work is of benefit to all Christians. Clear articulations of both Mennonite and Catholic positions in dialogue add to the value of this book. I highly recommend it.”
—Maxwell E. Johnson, Professor of Theology, The University of Notre Dame
Father Drew Christiansen SJ died on April 6 at the Jesuit community in Georgetown University. Christiansen was an early participant in Bridgefolk and an enthusiastic supporter of Mennonite-Catholic dialogue at many levels. In a 2003 article entitled “An Exchange of Gifts” that summarized various streams of that dialogue and recounted the influence of Mennonites on his own theological reflection, Christiansen expressed confidence that “Catholics and Mennonites have begun to become sources of renewal for one another” through this unexpected but holy exchange.
Fr. Drew Chrstiansen SJ, 1945-2022
When the first Bridgefolk conference at Saint John’s University in 2002 compared key beliefs and practices of Mennonites and Catholics, Christiansen summarized Catholic social teaching on peace and war. He was also a major panelist at a 2007 conference at the University of Notre Dame assessing the final report the of Mennonite World Conference and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, “Called Together to Be Peacemakers.”
Christiansen had participated in that international dialogue, which took place from 1998 and 2003, and had helped to draft the report. His extensive writing on Catholic social teaching and peacemaking was informed not only by his theological education but by years of work representing both the U.S. bishops’ conference and the Vatican in global peacemaking efforts, especially in the Middle East. At the time of his death he was Distinguished Professor of Ethics and Human Development in Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service and a senior fellow at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs.
Read more:
America magazine’s obituary. America is the leading Catholic magazine in the United States, edited by U.S. Jesuits. Christiansen served as its editor-in-chief from 2005-2012.
On the occasion of the just-completed Week of Christian Unity, L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican daily newspaper, has published a report on the state of ecumenical dialogue by Bishop Brian Farrell, Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. The report mentions the trilateral Lutheran-Catholic-Mennonite dialogue, along with some 15 other bilateral dialogues and discussions in which the pontifical council was engaged during 2020.
Mutual understanding and reciprocal trust
22 January 2021
The year 2020 will long be remembered for the transformation of life, communal and personal, caused by the pandemic. The Ecumenical world, too, has suffered from the restriction imposed due to the health crisis. In relationships among Christians, divided but eager to overcome separations, personal contacts are essential. The mutual understanding and reciprocal trust necessary to deepen communion are born and grow only through encounter. Many meetings, many church gatherings and ecumenical dialogues have had to be cancelled or postponed to a future date. Certain meetings have been replaced by video conferences, but there is no doubt that a conversation mediated by technology does not produce the same effect as an exchange of ideas, beliefs, and motivations that takes place in person. Yet, even in this fateful year, the search for Christian unity has continued, and has made progress. Sixty years after its founding (June 1960), the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity (pcpuc) carries onward with conviction its mandate: to promote ecumenism in the Catholic Church and the relationships of the Catholic Church with other Christians, in their Churches and communities. …
