September 2013

September content

Not all the 1,800 seats were taken in Vancouver’s former Centre for the Performing Arts on launch Sunday, Sept. 29, but only a few chairs were vacant as the Westside Church held its first service downtown, in the heart of the city. “The Centre” is Westside’s new home.

John Siebert is one of four 2013 recipients of the Canadian Mennonite University Blazer awards for alumni of CMU (or its predecessor colleges) who “embody CMU’s values and mission of service, leadership, and reconciliation in church and society.” Currently executive director of Project Ploughshares, an agency of the Canadian Council of Churches that works to prevent war and build peace, he has also worked in the Canadian foreign service, as a consultant to NGOs, and for the United Church of Canada on the advancement of human rights.

A Vancouver church, started in a Kitsilano movie theatre in 2005, is excited to have a permanent home. Westside Church purchased the 1,800-seat Centre for the Performing Arts, a live theatre venue downtown near Vancouver’s library square. The first official service was slated to be held in The Centre Sept. 29, 2013. Westside pastor Norm Funk said when the opportunity to acquire the building arose, church leaders looked at their current and future rental costs and saw the advantage to ownership. The church was renting meeting space on Granville Island and office space on West Broadway.

“Is Jesus first in your life?” MB Mission general director Randy Friesen asked the 250 people gathered for AWAKE, a pilot team-based event held at Waterloo Mennonite Brethren Church (WMB) in Kitchener-Waterloo, Ont., Sept. 20–22. Organized by MB Mission in partnership with the Canadian Conference of MB Churches’ church planting arm, C2C Network, AWAKE was designed to renew individuals and local churches in their love for God, love for their cities, and passion for global outreach.

Have you ever wished to be someone else? In Pacific Theatre’s 2013/2014 season opener, The Foreigner by Larry Shue, Charlie Baker tries on a new identity, taking the audience on a humorous but instructive journey. The intimate theatre setting, the simple yet elegant set, and the gifted actors make this two-act comedy set in present- day Georgia a must-see show.

1963 was an extraordinary year, said Esther Epp-Tiessen, author of a soon-to-be-published history of MCC in Canada. Mennonite Central Committee Canada celebrated the organization’s 50th year of existence with a dessert reception at Canadian Mennonite University, Sept. 20., where Epp observed that in 1963, Bob Dylan wrote “The times they are a-changin’” and indeed they were: Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I have a dream” speech at the march on Washington, the FLQ began its activities in Quebec – and MCC Canada was born.

“If I don’t share my story, nobody’s going to know what’s happening in our world,” says Shannon Lynn, a speaker at the Caught in Traffick conference hosted by the Women’s Inter-Church Council of Canada at Canadian Mennonite University, June 21–23, 2013.

Each year, Bethany College staff and faculty prepare, plan, and pray that the college’s courses, residences, service-learning trips, dramas, and ministry teams will shape the students and teach them to follow Christ with integrity and joy. Each year, staff and faculty at the Hepburn, Sask., school are shaped by these same students.

“I have a headache everyday worrying about how I will pay my rent and feed my family.” That’s what Syrian refugee Amoun Habouch, who is caring for eight children, told Foodgrains Bank executive director Jim Cornelius in August when he visited her in Lebanon.

Jennifer Forbes was the first female auctioneer to serve at the Mennonite Central Committee Festival for World Relief in Abbotsford, B.C., Sept. 6–7, 2013. Forbes lent her sing-song voice to the Friday evening auction and sold the loaf of bread on Saturday morning.

Pastor Robyn Dueck remembers clearly a conversation she overheard years ago at a symposium in California. Sitting in a corner chat area, she overheard a group of people bemoaning the lack of help in most churches for special needs families.

Six “plus-60” individuals from Fort Garry Mennonite Brethren Church, Winnipeg, will hike through the Grand Canyon, Sept. 14–18, to raise funds for Eden Health Care Services’s new housing project on the campus of Concordia Hospital, Winnipeg.