Canadian Mennonite
Volume 10, No. 03
February 6, 2006


WiderChurch

Building relationships important for aboriginal ministry

Winnipeg

Edith and Neill von Gunten, new co-directors of Mennonite Church Canada Native Ministries, recently visited dozens of First Nation communities, congregations, and other denominations and church-related bodies that minister to aboriginal people.

Unannounced, Neill and Edith von Gunten knocked on a door just as family birthday festivities for Grandma were about to begin. Sensitive to the awkward timing, the von Guntens indicated they would move on, but instead were invited to share some songs and Bible readings, and then warmly welcomed to stay for the celebration meal.

This was just one of many experiences the Mennonite Church Canada Native Ministries co-directors encountered on their recent cross-country learning tour of First Nation communities. The objective of the tour was to become more closely acquainted with what is already happening—and to discern an optimal course of direction for the future of Native Ministries.

Along the way, the von Guntens also visited MC Canada congregations, Aboriginal Neighbours staff of Mennonite Central Committee, and other aboriginal and non-aboriginal agencies, Christian organizations and denominational church offices, to learn more about how connections are built with First Nation peoples.

“Meeting each one face-to-face and feeling their willingness to work together was a real encouragement,” says Edith.

Despite the many church members who already connect with aboriginals in their professional jobs, the von Guntens observed that congregations are slow to recognize the daily working lives of their members as “the church scattered.”

In one congregation the von Guntens met a teacher with many years of experience teaching aboriginal students. She expressed deep gratitude for all she had learned at a one-day seminar sponsored by local aboriginal leaders from an adjacent community. “But she hasn’t really shared much with others because there were no forums for doing so within her church,” Edith says. “She is a valuable resource that is not being tapped.”

Two primary themes surfaced from the tour, say the von Guntens:

• Building relationships is the first, and most vital, part of learning to know others; and,

• A need to be open and willing to learn from others.

At one church Neill shared his story of working in an African-American ghetto in Chicago as a young man. What he learned in those two years about life, another culture, and the prejudices and feelings he had himself, was transformative.

“It was beautiful to realize how sharing Neill’s experience freed a native person in the group to share his story,” says Edith.

A meeting with members in another church revealed how the congregation had been enriched and stretched by an aboriginal man who has become a member in recent years. He has come to feel at home in the church, and his sense of humour and honesty have enabled him to reach out to the non-native members of the congregation with love and frankness about what he sees and feels around him. His faith in God and his compassion for others in his community is evident, and he provides a relationship-building model of ministry.

“What excited us the most was the interest that a growing number of Mennonite people have in each province for learning about, and relating to, their aboriginal neighbours in some way,” says Neill.

—MC Canada release by Dan Dyck

Retired farmer returns to Iraq to serve with CPT

Tavistock, Ont.

Allan Slater, centre (in checked shirt), was commissioned to serve with Christian Peacemaker Teams at a service at Tavistock Mennonite Church.

Seventy-year-old Allan Slater left last month for Iraq to serve with Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) following a commissioning service at Tavistock Mennonite Church on Jan. 16. The emotional and celebratory gathering for the retired Zorra Township farmer included more than 100 family members, friends, supporters and prayer partners.

Ignoring advice from the Canadian government—which has cautioned citizens from travelling to Iraq, in light of the kidnapping of four CPT team members (including two Canadians) last November—Slater has chosen to make a fourth trip to the war-torn country and rejoin his fellow CPT members there.

The commissioning service—intended as a time of worship, encouragement, hope and celebration—was exactly that. Hearty singing of such hymns as “God of Grace and God of Glory,” “Guide My Feet,” and “O Healing River” was most inspiring.

Slater was accompanied by his wife Bev, a daughter and son, and five young grandchildren.

His daughter Sarah offered her dad good wishes. “You make me very proud, but, God, it’s going to be hard, and as much as I get it, I wish you didn’t have to do this,” she said. “A lot of people when they retire just go to Florida.”

Other well-wishers offered their blessings to Slater.

Anne-Marie Lappano of Stratford, Ont., presented Slater with “peace pillows” symbolizing Canadians’ care, concern and love for the Iraqis. The pillows, embroidered with a dove and olive branch, are to be distributed where Slater deems most appropriate.

In his address to those gathered, Slater mentioned that he had been asked recently if he was crazy. Replying that he didn’t think so, he said, “War is crazy, I’m pretty sure of that. I’m pretty sure that the trauma and chaos of war drive people crazy. And I’m sure I’m not crazy enough to think I can change the whole world.”

He added, “It’s old men that start wars and send young men to fight wars. It’s time that a few old men try and stop them. I see that as my role.”

Slater implored those present to pray for him. “Pray for the people of Iraq. Pray for the four people who are missing. Pray for the soldiers who have been sent to Iraq and should be home with their families. And please pray for my family as well. I know they’re finding it pretty tough.”

The commissioning service included a sending prayer—led by Slater’s pastor, Rev. Richard Hryniw of East Nissouri Union Church—with many of the gathered supporters laying hands of blessing on their departing friend.

The mixed group of Catholics, Anglicans, United Church members, Muslims, Mennonites and others in attendance were uplifted by a local group of musicians called No Discernable Key, who especially caught the attention of Slater’s grandchildren, prompting smiles from them.

The singing of the spiritual “Down to the River to Pray” provided a fitting ending to the service.

At the time of the commissioning service, the fate of Canadians James Loney and Harmeet Singh Sooden, along with Briton Norman Kember and American Tom Fox, who were taken hostage by on Nov. 26, was unknown.

—Gordon Bauman

French Mennonites fan African flames of mission

Buhl, France

During a week when the rhetoric from French officials toward immigrants of African descent flared as explosively as the cars burning in the streets, Mennonites in the northeastern part of the country warmly welcomed delegations from Botswana, Burkina Faso, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa, Canada and the United States.

On Nov. 11, Jean-Paul Pelsy—president of the Comité de Mission Mennonite Français (French Mennonite Mission Committee) and host for the gathering—opened the week of meetings during which the Africa Inter-Mennonite Mission (AIMM) International Central Council met for the second time since the agency restructured its program two years ago. Pelsy greeted 25 representatives with words from Psalm 133: “How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity.”

In the course of the business sessions, the French Mennonite Mission Committee united with AIMM to become an official member of the Burkina Faso Partnership Council, joining four other agencies: the Église Évangélique Mennonite de Burkina Faso (Burkina Faso Mennonite Church), Mennonite Church Canada Witness, Mennonite Mission Network and the Evangelical Mennonite Conference in United States and Canada.

“It is truly exciting to see this small group of French Mennonites join the Burkina Faso Partnership Council,” said Janet Plenert, who represented MC Canada Witness at the meetings.

The four national AIMM partnership councils, in various stages of organization, also met to draft and refine their mission statements. This work continued a reconfiguration begun in June 2004, when African Mennonite leaders and representatives of North American mission agencies that related to them met to transform the institution so more administrative functions would reside in Africa.

The Burkina Faso Partnership Council, whose ministry has been primarily in villages, finalized plans for a venture into urban mission in the capital city, Ouagadougou. In addition to addressing the spiritual needs of urban non-Christians, Mennonite leaders in Burkina Faso want to reach out to their own youths who move to the cities to attend high school and university. They believe the church is losing its successors to other denominations when there is no Mennonite church near these institutions of higher learning. Jeff and Tany Warkentin of Springridge Mennonite Church, Alta., are arriving this month to begin this ministry.

By the beginning of the 2007 school year, the Burkina Faso Partnership Council hopes to have a Mennonite dormitory and church in Bobo Dioulasso, the country’s second largest city.

“This way of working together feels right,” said Donna Entz of Fiske Mennonite Church, Sask., a mission worker through AIMM, MC Canada Witness and Mennonite Mission Network in Burkina Faso since 1978. “We are excited that mission is being developed by the church [in Burkina Faso] rather than being driven from North America. This is a first.”

The Congolese Partnership Council, dealing with a complex situation that brings together three Mennonite denominations, worked at forging a common vision.

“We live together and we must be open and willing to share with each other,” said Adolphe Komuesa, president of the Communauté Mennonite au Congo (Mennonite Community of Congo).

The embryonic partnership councils of Botswana and South Africa also discussed which institutions should be invited to become members.

“Although AIMM’s new structure still has a lot of shortcomings, I see signs indicating that African leaders are being increasingly empowered to shape their own future,” said Rod Hollinger-Janzen, AIMM’s executive coordinator. “They now have a stronger voice in decision-making.”

AIMM personnel worshipped, preached and built fraternal relationships in 10 local French Mennonite churches during their week in Buhl. They found that many of the congregations were working with African youths in their neighbourhoods. Although Africans in many French cities had rioted to protest racial injustice, there was no sign of violence in the Mennonite communities.

French Mennonite youths met with AIMM representatives to plan a mission trip this summer. They will help build a recording studio for a recently begun Christian radio ministry in local languages.

—Lynda Hollinger-Janzen


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