Author: gws

American Benedictine Academy to “Seek Peace and Pursue It”

The American Benedictine Academy has chosen as the theme of its 2012 annual meeting, “Seek Peace and Pursue It: Monasticism in the Midst of Global Upheaval.”  The conference will be held at St. Scholastic Monastery in Duluth MN.  Bridgefolk board member Weldon Nisly will be one of the featured speakers.  (Those planning to attend the Bridgefolk conference in Minnesota in late July should note that the ABA conference is the following weekend, approximately three hours away.)

For more information and registration forms, go to http://www.osb.org/aba/2012/.

Leading ecumenist Br. Jeffrey Gros, FSC, highlights Lutheran-Mennonite footwashing in keynote address

A keynote address by Br. Jeffrey Gros, FSC, to the 2011 National Workshop on Christian Unity last May has recently come to our attention.  In it he called attention to the use of footwashing at a historic service of repentance and reconciliation, in which representatives of the Lutheran World Federation confessed 16th-century persecution of Anabaptists as a sin.  This “icon” should serve as a model for planning similar commemorations as Christians around the world mark the 500-year anniversary of the Protestant Reformation in 2017, he said.   Continue reading “Leading ecumenist Br. Jeffrey Gros, FSC, highlights Lutheran-Mennonite footwashing in keynote address” →

Darrin Snyder Belousek wins award for article on financial crisis

Bridgefolk board member Darrin Snyder Belousek has won an award from the Intercollegiate Studies Institute for an article he wrote in 2010 in the Journal of Markets and Morality entitled ““Market Exchange, Self-Interest, and the Common Good: Financial Crisis and Moral Economy.”  The Templeton Enterprise Awards on the Culture of Enterprise are given annually to the best books and articles published in the previous year on the culture of enterprise. The awards are designed to encourage young scholars (thirty-nine or younger at the time of publication) to explore and illuminate the process by which economics and culture are related throughout the world.  Snyder Belousek, a Mennonite, notes that the article is “effectively a Catholic-Mennonite affair,” since “the tradition of Catholic Social Teaching substantially informs the argument.”

  • Click here to read the award-winning article.
  • Click here for award website.
  • Click here to read a shorter version of Snyder Belousek’s article which appeared in America magazine in 2009

 

MWC requests prayer for Honduran church following murder of pastor

Mennonite World Conference has issued the following press release in the wake of the murder of Rafael Erasmo Arevalo, a Mennonite pastor in Santa Rosa de Copán, Honduras.  Bridgefolk participant Joetta Schlabach has been traveling in Central America and had recently talked with other church workers in the Copán area.  Motives for the murder are not known, but Schlabach reports that tensions are high in the area.  In many parts of the country, gang and drug-related violence are exacerbating a repressive climate continuing in the wake of a 2009 coup in Honduras.  Further tensions in the Copán area surround efforts to organize miners working for Canadian mining companies.  

On Sunday, January 22, Rafael Erasmo Arevalo, a Mennonite pastor in Honduras, was attacked and killed after leading an evening worship service. Arevalo, from Santa Rosa de Copán, drove about 20 kilometres north to Veracruz, where he had led worship services for the past 10 years.

According to a report in a Honduran newspaper, La Prensa, Arevalo parked his car at the home of a Veracruz city councilor and then walked to the church. When he returned to his car after the worship service, he was attacked by “unknown persons.” His body was not discovered until the next morning, about five kilometers from the scene of the attack. Continue reading “MWC requests prayer for Honduran church following murder of pastor” →

Margaret O’Gara to address Washington (DC) Theological Consortium on Christian unity, February 2

Professor Margaret O’Gara, Canadian ecumenical leader and Bridgefolk Board member, is scheduled  be the featured speaker at the annual Washington Theological Consortium Figel Lectures on Christian Unity in Washington DC Feb 2 2012.  Additional information can be obtained by visiting the  Washington Theological Consortium website:  http://www.washtheocon.org/consortium_events.html

Continue reading “Margaret O’Gara to address Washington (DC) Theological Consortium on Christian unity, February 2” →

Larry Miller reflects on 22 years at the helm of Mennonite World Conference

Mennonite World Conference
news release

by Phyllis Pellman Good

“As long as the wind is in its sails. . .”

Larry Miller remembers one moment clearly when, as a 38-year-old, he was weighing whether or not to accept the nomination to lead Mennonite World Conference. The year was 1988, 23 years ago, and he was sitting in a university library in Strasbourg, France, where he lived.

“I was working on my dissertation, and I looked up and noticed a book by one of my professors on a shelf. I pulled it down. It was dusty, and no one had ever checked it out. I suddenly realized that I was poised to write those kinds of books!”

Miller speaks at the 2009 Executive Committee meetings in Paraguay. To his left are Danisa Ndlovu, incoming MWC president that year, and Nancy Heisey, who was completing her term as president. Photo: Merle Good

Miller was finishing his doctorate in New Testament and was under consideration for a graduate-level teaching position in that field in the Protestant faculty at the University of Strasbourg. But something unexpected had come his way. The European Mennonite churches had together nominated him to be Executive Secretary of Mennonite World Conference. Continue reading “Larry Miller reflects on 22 years at the helm of Mennonite World Conference” →

Invoking the gift of unity among Christians

VATICAN CITY, 18 JAN 2012 (VIS) – The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, which begins today, was the theme of Benedict XVI’s general audience celebrated this morning in the Paul VI Hall. The Holy Father explained how this initiative has been held annually for more than a century and brings together Christians from Churches and ecclesial communities, who “invoke that extraordinary gift for which the Lord Jesus prayed during the Last Supper: … ‘That they may all be one'”. Continue reading “Invoking the gift of unity among Christians” →

Week of prayer for Christian unity begins tomorrow

VATICAN CITY, 17 JAN 2012 (VIS) – The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity is due to begin tomorrow, 18 January, under the theme “We will all be changed by the victory of our Lord Jesus Christ”. The Week is promoted by the World Council of Churches (WCC), a worldwide fellowship of 349 Churches seeking unity, common witness and Christian service. The Catholic Church participates in this ecumenical initiative, despite not being a member of the WCC. Continue reading “Week of prayer for Christian unity begins tomorrow” →