Last year I also wrote a summer column from the Netherlands, “Look for hope.” Then we were here for a few weeks, mostly on an extended family visit, but now it is five months because of my wife’s sabbatical. As a result, we have had a much more in-depth experience of the state of this…
“Many Canadian churches are battlegrounds today between camps with opposing views.” So begins a Christian Courier editorial by Robert Vander Vennen published on January 11, 1991. Vander Vennen’s words could accurately describe this present moment in the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) too, as the denomination fractures over differing definitions of sexuality, chastity and sin. In…
One of the overpasses along the Queen Elizabeth Way in southern Ontario is spray-painted with three short words: “They all lie.” Think about it: ‘They all lie.’ This anonymous graffiti-sociologist has captured the zeitgeist of our age profoundly. This epithet identifies a spirit that is fuelled by cynicism, suspicion, anger and even contempt. This spirit…
Can there be resurrection /
among the ruins? /
Dare we imagine new life /
rising from these streets of death?
On November 26, Israel and Hezbollah finally agreed to a ceasefire in Lebanon, bringing reprieve after more than a year of violence. At the end of September, Israel had launched a ground invasion and intensified its bombing. As a communications specialist with World Renew, I’ve been receiving updates from my colleagues living in the midst…
“You can’t understand what it means to us when you come to us in this hard time,” the bishop said. It was our first day in the West Bank: a dozen Canadians on a 10-day Solidarity Pilgrimage hosted by Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem. Despite only living four miles away from where we…
Canada, 2008-2015. Also Argentina. Australia. Congo. Czech Republic. Fiji. Finland. Ireland. Liberia. Morocco. Norway. Paraguay. Peru. Poland. Philippines. Sierra Leone. South Africa. South Korea. Taiwan. The Ukraine. What do all these countries have in common? After the coup, after apartheid, after colonialism, after civil war – they’ve each had to figure out: how can embattled…
From May 22 to 24, 2024, Christians from around the world gathered at the seventh annual Christ at the Checkpoint (CATC) conference in Jesus’ hometown to learn about the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. During his opening talk, Rev. Dr. Munther Isaac, a Palestinian Lutheran pastor, called for Christian unity and action. “Thank you for responding to…
Nine months have passed since that dark day when Hamas launched its surprise attack on Israel from its stronghold in Gaza. Since then, we have witnessed much suffering on the part of Palestinian civilians at the hands of the Israeli military. My wife and I regularly watch the PBS Newshour, which has thoroughly covered the…
Bondye konnen – God knows. This phrase is often spoken in the communities of Haiti. Not spoken in tones of hopelessness but with assurance, with the deep hope that even in the darkest situations, God’s light shines. He knows. It’s early Wednesday morning, 6 a.m., March 13, and I am being driven by our Children…
“I do not see hope. I make hope. Hope is something I create,” said Israeli peace activist Maoz Inon, taking inspiration from a Palestinian activist who used the same words (you can read more in my article “Making hope, demanding peace” in CC‘s April 2024 issue). It is an admirable attitude to hold in the…
“I could not, not see the image of a table set with tea in the midst of rubble. It had been in my mind for years,” explains Karen Tamminga-Paton, the Alberta artist whose art installation, Peacetalks, recently exhibited at Revelstoke Visual Arts Centre in British Columbia. Tamminga-Paton was beginning an artist’s residency in France with…
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