Women in Odessa, Kherson, Zaporozhe, Dnipro and Kiev adorn themselves in the colors and fragrances of happy gardens that belie Ukraine’s brutal history. Men without shirts in the villages of what had been...
[read more]
While on the faculty of Harvard Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass., J. Lawrence Burkholder participated in an integration effort on March 31, 1964, in Saint Augustine, Fla., which made headlines in newspapers...
[read more]
In 2015, the Delegate Assembly of MC USA passed the Churchwide Statement on Sexual Abuse. It says: “We lament that sexual abuse exists not only in our society but also within our own homes, congregations and...
[read more]
The good news is human beings are a lot less violent today than at any other time in human history. The bad news is religion has been — and continues to be — a major contributor to violence. Those are a...
[read more]
Nur Jemon remembers that the day she fled her home in the Rakhine district of Myanmar started as it did every other day. The Rohingya Muslim woman was cooking rice when the military stormed her village,...
[read more]
TSHIKAPA, Democratic Republic of Congo — More than 200 teachers have received training in Evangelization Through Literacy initiated by female leaders of three Mennonite denominations. The new teachers are...
[read more]
For several years, Kenya has been a flashpoint of Christian-Muslim conflict. With each incident of terror, the tension increases. Kenyan Mennonites are finding hope in small incidents of transformation. Kenya...
[read more]Hillary Watson (Column, July 30) challenges Mennonites to ask, “Who are we and who do we want to be in the abortion debate?” Mennonites have defined themselves as people of peace even when the cost is...
[read more]I come from a people called the Banyamulenge. We are cattle herders and live in the high mountains of eastern Congo overlooking Lake Tanganyika. Over the years, my people have been forced from one area to...
[read more]
Michael J. Sharp, a Mennonite worker with the United Nations who was killed in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2017, was awarded the United Nations Dag Hammarskjöld Medal on June 1 in New York City in...
[read more]
The story of the Democratic Republic of Congo casts a long, disturbing shadow. The legacy of colonialism thrusts malevolent roots into the kingdoms of the Congo basin, which sustains the second largest country...
[read more]
“Fill me with your love, O Lord,” I say to myself as I breathe in. “And free me from fear,” I think on the exhale. I’m sitting in a black van, parked on the side of the highway in Syria. As I look...
[read more]When James H. Cone, a leading founder of the black theology movement, died last month, I felt the loss personally. Cone’s book God of the Oppressed changed my theological career. Early on, I knew Mennonites...
[read more]
Imagine the pain of losing a child to war, compounded by not having a safe space to express grief. This is Claudia Antonovna Ushakova’s story. Her son, a soldier in the Ukrainian army, died in combat at the...
[read more]
Agnès Ntumba remembers the day her husband and seven children fled the violence that took over their village in the Kasai region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. “I saw people being killed. They were...
[read more]
A few years ago I learned that a Native American coffee shop was opening near my church. A native business other than a casino got my attention. I found this place to be one of the friendliest social gathering...
[read more]
The community lined the sides of the road to welcome six vehicles rolling in from an arduous 500-mile journey from Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. More than 30 Congolese Mennonite leaders and mission...
[read more]
The other day, I was watching over my wife’s shoulder at a video on Facebook. It was a bunch of celebrities speaking up for gun control in the aftermath of the Florida shootings. Ho hum. These sorts of...
[read more]
KIKWIT, Democratic Republic of Congo — Loving the generous people of the Democratic Republic of Congo is not difficult, but evil happening in the rural Kasaï region of that lush country is hard to...
[read more]
“As a dog returns to his vomit, so a fool repeats his folly.” — Prov. 26:11 We find ourselves, again, in a place of sadness, anger and pain in the aftermath of a mass shooting. A teacher and 17 students...
[read more]
What good is it if you say you have faith but do not have works? James’ question in chapter 2 doesn’t so much pit faith and works against each other, as two opposing beliefs about the path to salvation, as...
[read more]
Another suspect in the killing of a Mennonite United Nations investigator in the Democratic Republic of Congo was arrested Dec. 29, but an understanding of who killed Michael J. Sharp — and why — continues...
[read more]
While North American Mennonites sped the pace of change in their church structures, Mennonites in the Democratic Republic of Congo dealt with matters of life and death. Ethnic and political violence drove at...
[read more]
Displaced people who recently received food and shelter supplies distributed by Mennonite churches in the Kasai region of the Democratic Republic of Congo have seen unimaginable horrors. Innoncente Ngandu...
[read more]
Imagine with me — it’s a beautiful Thursday afternoon. The leaves are fallen; the air is cool and crisp. Families everywhere have gathered together for their annual Thanksgiving celebrations. Suddenly, out...
[read more]