Category: Commentary

Salvation and peace: bridging another divide

An artificial divide

by Darrin Snyder Belousek

[The following article by Bridgefolk’s Executive Director appeared recently in PeaceSigns, the online magazine of the Mennonite Church USA Peace and Justice Support Network]

 

There were several things that attracted me to the Mennonite-Christian tradition-discipleship, community, simplicity, service, and, of course, peace. In my fifteen years among the Mennonites, however, I have observed two disconcerting tendencies in the Mennonite peace ethic.

First, too often we practice peacemaking as if peace were the fruit of our good intentions and hard work. We thus neglect two things: the reality of the persistence of sin in ourselves and our world despite our best intentions, and the need for divine grace to sustain the spiritual fertility of human effort. Consequently, Mennonite peace activism can often be a cause of frustration (when our intentions falter) or an occasion for pride (when our efforts “succeed”).

Second, too often we think and talk about peace in ways that reflect our national contexts and reveal our political commitments. We thus forget two things: that our hope for peace is to be set on God’s purposes for the world, and that our commitment to peace is to be aligned with the priorities of God’s kingdom. Consequently, Mennonite peace rhetoric can often be hardly distinguishable from a national “peacekeeper” identity (Canada) or a left-wing partisan agenda (United States).

Ivan Kauffman surveys 50 years of Mennonite-Catholic dialogue

Earlier this month Bridgefolk co-founder Ivan Kauffman spoke at Assembly Mennonite Church in Goshen, Indiana.  His talk offers a succinct overview of how Mennonite-Catholic dialogue has unfolded in the last 50 years. 

Called Together to Be Peacemakers
Mennonite Catholic Dialogue 1962-2012

Ivan J. Kauffman
Assembly Mennonite Church
Goshen, Indiana
July 8, 2012

It has been said we over-estimate what can be changed in one year, and under-estimate what can be changed in ten years. My life experience confirms that. But I would add that we can not even imagine the change that can take place in 50 years.

When the Second Vatican Council opened 50 years ago this October I was a student at Goshen College, at a time when Carl Kreider was still wearing a plain coat, and Mary Oyer was still wearing a covering. None of us then had any idea this event would affect us—that it would permanently change relationships between Mennonites and Catholics and launch us into a new era in the Church’s peace witness—but that is what has happened.

I could keep us here for hours telling stories about how this happened but I will briefly mention only a few. Continue reading “Ivan Kauffman surveys 50 years of Mennonite-Catholic dialogue” →

The anguish of imperfect communion

by Julia Smucker

(Our friends at the Ekklesia Project recently posted the following reflection by Julia Smucker on Bridgefolk experiences with the challenge of sharing communion.) 

For about the past five years, I have been a participant in the Mennonite/Catholic ecumenical movement known as Bridgefolk – first as a Mennonite drawn toward communion with the Catholic Church but also strongly connected to my ecclesial heritage, and now as a Catholic seeking to maintain that connection with the church that formed me.  I had agonized over the choice I was presented with in the unavoidable reality that joining with one communion would mean breaking with another, and wondered whether I could do so without it being tantamount to a rejection, a cutting off of my roots.  And then I discovered a group of people who had been agonizing over this division for years before me.  Continue reading “The anguish of imperfect communion” →

“Spirituality versus Religion: Or maybe it’s not new….” commentary by Jana Bennett

Current debates over “traditional religion” sometimes track partially with ecumenical dialogue between Mennonites and Catholics.  The following blog by University of Dayton theology professor Jana Bennett may therefore be of interest to Bridgefolk.  

I’ve been reading a lot lately around the blogosphere from people who find themselves at odds with “traditional Christianity,” by which seems to be meant “the version of Christianity I grew up with.”  One of the most interesting is here at Rachel Held Evans’ blog: Kim Van Brunt describes leaving traditional worship services, in part because she felt the traditions themselves – the bulletins and Wednesday night prayer services and so on – were stilting her family’s ability to hear and live the gospel.  Many of the commenters complained that she seemed to be advocating a church of one, an individual’s paradisaical version of Christ’s body – so before readers here jump to that conclusion, let me just say that in her own response to the comments, she now belongs to what would probably be called a “house church” – an informal gathering of people meeting to support and witness to each other.

There are others feeling compressed by “tradition”.  One of the big ones, of course, is the viral video “Why I Hate Religion but Love Jesus” which was followed up with numerous posts about being spiritual but not religious.  In another vein, there have been Catholics thinking through the contraception debates in relation to feeling like the “hierarchy”.  In still another vein, members of the “emergent church” who feel that “traditional” forms of Christianity are increasingly irrelevant.   Continue reading ““Spirituality versus Religion: Or maybe it’s not new….” commentary by Jana Bennett” →

Advent issue of The Mennonite features cover story on Mary

For Advent this year, the cover story for the December issue of The Mennonite asks how Mennonites should think of Mary as “model and mother.”  A related article reflects on Mary’s Magnificat, and two poems portray the role of Joseph and Elizabeth in the drama of Jesus’ birth.  Another article, by Bridgefolk board member Darrin Snyder Belousek, recounts his story of returning to faith through friendship with Roman Catholics.   The Mennonite is the official denominational magazine of Mennonite Church USA.

Click here to access the December issue of The Mennonite.

“Contours of the Catholic Mind” by Julia Smucker

Bridgefolk participant Julia Smucker recently posted the following reflection on the blog site Vox Nova.  

One year ago, following about six years of will-I-won’t-I agonizing, I finally made it all the way into the Catholic Church. In my ongoing immersion into the Catholic world before and since (call it mystagogy, call it acculturation), I have observed a number of interesting patterns I might characterize as quintessentially Catholic ways of thinking. Of course, this is emphatically not to say that all Catholics think alike – we’re as far spread all over the map as anybody, to be sure. And I am more and more convinced that there is no such thing as a typical Catholic. And yet, paradoxically, there are certain recognizable tendencies I’ve picked up in this oddly fascinating process of developing a Catholic mind, several of which, I find, seem to suit me surprisingly well. Here are a few of those tendencies as observed after a year of being Catholic. Continue reading ““Contours of the Catholic Mind” by Julia Smucker” →

Blessed are the merciful

by Dora Dueck
Borrowing Bones blog

I belong to a Mennonite-Catholic dialogue group which meets several times a year. Our assignment for this week’s meeting was a personal reflection on the Beatitudes, broadly, and then more specifically, in choosing one beatitude we were particularly “attracted” to at this point — in not more than seven minutes each! The contributions were varied, and all interesting. This was mine:

I memorized many parts of the Sermon on the Mount as a child, to get a reduction on Bible camp fees. So it seems the Beatitudes have been with me forever, like old markers, like a fence around my life. They’ve been markers for my (Mennonite) understanding of discipleship.

In this reflection, however, I was struck by something else. The opening beatitudes [blessed are the poor, mourning, meek, hungry], at least, seem an expression of holes in the soul. I see need, grief, poverty of whatever kind, hunger. Yes, there’s a happiness expressed, but next to gaping wounds. Continue reading “Blessed are the merciful” →

Mennonite interchurch leader analyzes shift away from just war theory

Writing in the Sept. 12 issue of the Mennonite Weekly Review, Andre Gingerich Stoner observes that leaders of Christian churches from around the world are increasingly concluding that the just war theory is obsolete.  Stoner is director of holistic witness and interchurch relations for Mennonite Church USA.  Here is his commentary:
André Gingerich Stoner

Just war concept obsolete
by André Gingerich Stoner
Mennonite Weekly Review

In a remarkable shift, a key World Council of Churches statement describes the concept of a just war as obsolete. It calls for a fundamental shift in ethical practice to what it calls “just peace.”

The Ecumenical Call to Just Peace repeatedly lifts up the life, teachings, death and resurrection of Jesus as the model for Christian peacemaking.

The 13-page document is peppered with sentences like, “Jesus told us to love our enemies, pray for our persecutors, and not to use deadly weapons … Despite persecution, he remains steadfast in his active nonviolence, even to death.”

Continue reading “Mennonite interchurch leader analyzes shift away from just war theory” →