Category: Resources for study

Receiving grace through countercultural footwashing

By Brian Miller
Mennonite Weekly Review
April 21, 2011

There’s no way around it — washing someone’s feet can be a bit awkward, especially if you are newer to this practice. In a day of vibey church cafes and artsy gathering spaces with sofas and technological whatsits, in a day when every attempt is made to make church appealing to the “spiritual but not religious,” in this day, we gather once again to practice footwashing.

But why? What compels us to continue this practice? Continue reading “Receiving grace through countercultural footwashing” →

Catholic Peace Fellowship magazine features Bridgefolk connections

Now available online is the Catholic Peace Fellowship journal Seeds of Peace, which last year devoted an issue to exploring “Mennonites, Catholics, and the Peace of Christ.”

From the introduction:

Because the Catholic Peace Fellowship has its headquarters in Northern Indiana, we have been graced to live close to, and work closely with, many Mennonite friends. Some of us have been working with Mennonites for quite some time, since the early eighties when the Christian peace movement in this country was focused on resisting the arms race by witnessing to Jesus. The same was true during the First Gulf War, when Mennonites from around the country and in Europe took the lead in supporting military conscientious objectors. Since the attacks of September 11, Mennonites have made it their business to get in the way of war, particularly in their work in sending out Christian Peacemaking to Palestine, Iraq, wherever peace can be made. More recently, and closer to home, we have enjoyed the presence of Mennonites in animating the activities of peacemaking here in “Michiana,” as our region is called. And we in the Catholic Peace Fellowship have been the beneficiary of a close Mennonite friend, Biff Weidman, who rents out our space for a song. In ways temporal and spiritual, we are blessed with the Mennonites whose life and work we are privileged to share.  In this issue, we have focused on the fruitful relationship between Catholics and Mennonites that has been patiently cultivated over the past thirty or so years.

The issue features, among other articles, an excellent reflection by Bridgefolk participants Margie Pfeil and Biff Weidman.  Visit the journal in its original location here.

Vatican celebrates 50 years of ecumenical engagement

The Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity (PCPCU) assembled in November at the Vatican to mark a 50-year landmark in Roman Catholic ecumenical engagement.   On Pentecost 1960, as part of preparations for the Second Vatican Council, Pope John XXIII established the Catholic Church’s first secretariat for ecumenical dialogue.  The PCPCU is its successor organization, and is the body that held an official international dialogue with Mennonite World Conference from 1998-2003. Continue reading “Vatican celebrates 50 years of ecumenical engagement” →

Saint John’s awards Mennonite peacebuilder John Paul Lederach its highest honor

As part of its commencement ceremony May 9, Saint John’s University and Abbey in Minnesota awarded Mennonite peacebuilder John Paul Lederach its Pax Christi award.  The university’s highest honor, the Pax Christi award ” recognizes those who have devoted themselves to God by working in the tradition of Benedictine monasticism to serve others and to build a heritage of faith in the world.”  Saint John’s Abbey has hosted Bridgefolk conferences and Abbot John Klassen is the Catholic co-chair of Bridgefolk.  The text of the award appears below.

The public radio program Speaking of Faith, recently featured Lederach and his work. The program is at http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/2010/art-of-peace.  Gerald Schlabach, executive director of Bridgefolk and a colleague of Lederach’s in the 1980s, recommends this extensive interview as an introduction to the style of grassroots relationship-building that has influenced Bridgefolk’s approach to ecumenical dialogue.

Saint John’s Abbey and University
Collegeville, Minnesota

John Paul Lederach, coming from a Mennonite Christian tradition of peacemaking, you have had a life-long commitment to working toward the non-violent resolution of conflict.  Continue reading “Saint John’s awards Mennonite peacebuilder John Paul Lederach its highest honor” →

Study guide to help prepare world convocation on peace

Geneva (WCC) — “Telling the Truth About Ourselves and Our World”, a study guide on overcoming violence in contemporary contexts, has been published by the World Council of Churches in English, French, German and Spanish as part of the build-up to the International Ecumenical Peace Convocation (IEPC) in May 2011 at Kingston, Jamaica.

Gathering about 1,000 representatives from church-related peace networks from all over the world, the convocation will mark the culmination of the ongoing ecumenical Decade to Overcome Violence (2001-2010) – Churches Seeking Reconciliation and Peace.

Four main sections of the study guide provide resources for discussion of the central themes of the IEPC: peace in the community, peace with the Earth, peace in the marketplace and peace among peoples.

The pattern suggested as a process for considering each theme provides an opportunity to relate the theme to one’s own context and experience, further reflection on the theme in a global perspective, a search for one’s own vision of peace and a commitment to action.

The study guide also provides resources for prayer, study, further reading and action.

The publication is now available in English, French, German and Spanish on the Decade to Overcome Violence (DOV) website.

Printed booklets may be ordered from dov@wcc-coe.org; these hard copies are free of charge, but there will be a charge for shipping quantities of more than 25.

The DOV would welcome offers to translate the study guide into additional languages. Such translations would then be posted on the website.

The new study guide is a follow-up to the widely used DOV publication “Why Violence? Why Not Peace?” which has been translated into 16 languages.

Study guide “Telling the Truth About Ourselves and Our World” (pdf, 1.1 MB)

Decade to Overcome Violence (DOV)

International Ecumenical Peace Convocation (IEPC)

Bridgefolk director calls new book the fruit of much interchurch dialogue

Gerald W. Schlabach, Bridgefolk co-founder and long-time director, has just published a new book on the practices of stability that all Christian churches need to sustain community in an age of individualism and mobility of all kinds. “I know I’m being a little provocative with the title,” says Schlabach, “but Unlearning Protestantism is really the fruit of many years of interchurch dialogue. I have tried to listen to various traditions as they have grappled with the challenges of loyalty and dissent, and to share my reflections in a way that helps all of us grow together toward Christ.” Continue reading “Bridgefolk director calls new book the fruit of much interchurch dialogue” →

Resource for interchurch families

Follow this link to the website for the Association of Interchurch Families.  The organization “seeks to link all those families, groups, and Associations so that together we may grow in Christian unity, and become for our churches an ever-greater gift of healing of the scandal of disunity.

It takes seriously both our marriage commitment to one another and the fact that two churches are represented in our family; by affirming at local, national and global levels the gifts of interchurch families and their potential as a catalyst for wider church unity.”

The most recent newsletter can be found here.  Topics in this newsletter include “Spiritual Ecumenism in Interchurch Marital Spirituality” and “Interchurch Families: Domestic Churches.”

Recommended reading: “As Different as We Think: Catholics and Protestants”

Protestants and Catholics may use much the same vocabulary to express their respective beliefs and practices, but behind this common language lie different ways of thinking. Becoming aware of and paying attention to these differences is essential for fruitful ecumenical dialogue.

Bridgefolk board member Darrin Snyder Belousek calls our attention to a recent article in Books & Culture that explores those background assumptions in an especially succinct and helpful way. The full article is not available online, except to the magazine’s subscribers, but Darrin shares his summary below: Continue reading “Recommended reading: “As Different as We Think: Catholics and Protestants”” →