Biographical

well, i’ve never been a part of a blog before – not for travelling, for politics, or for random thoughts – but this one was too tempting to pass up…

i am a canadian mennonite living in ontario. i grew up in winnipeg manitoba – probably the closest one could get to a mennonite geneva. my grandfather was a missionary, my father is the executive director for the canadian conference of mennonite brethren churches, i went to a mennonite high school, college… well, you get the idea. borscht courses through my veins.

and yet my experience with the mennonites has been tumultuous. my home church in winnipeg was as evangelical as most of the other non-denoms (similar to how matt t described his situation in his opening post). it was unclear to most in the congregation what it was about this church that made it different from others. i moved to the usa to start graduate studies – a master’s in theology – and attended a mennonite church of a different sort. i was able to see how mennonites could be different. however, when i brought some of these ideas and opinions back home, i was met with hostility (including being black-balled from the mb canadian periodical. the senior editor there wants nothing to do with me – i guess that’s what makes this blog so attractive: everyone gets the floor).

currently i am having problems attending church. there is only one menno church in my city and it is neither young nor radical. i am doing a phd in religion and politics, so i like to think through the significance of mennonite practices in a politically hostile world (even canada is in afghanistan). i hope to contribute and be intrigued with conversations via yar

joe

Hey y’all,

My name is Matt and I have been checking out your blog for a while now and decided that I wanted in on the action.

I am a Mennonite born and bred — in fact a Canadian Mennonite (so the y’all that I used above is put on). You can’t get much more particularistic than that can you? I am what is known as an ethnic Mennonite — quite an odd concept and all but there you go. I grew up in a church that was deeply conscious of the problems inherent in an ethnic definition of the term Mennonite and dealt with it by trying to do everything it could to get rid of anything distinctively Mennonite/Anabaptist. Maybe we were embarrassed about being Mennonite — God knows it was awkward to be associated with horses and buggies all the time. So we just tried to fit in with all the evangelical churches in town.

But the fact that we were just like all other churches meant that there was no good reason to go to our church (unless you liked Mennonite food!), so when I moved away for college I went to all kinds of different churches. Not until I worked for a Canadian Chinese Mennonite Church (OK, the category of Canadian Chinese Mennonite is even more particularistic than Canadian Mennonite!) did I find myself becoming committed to Anabaptist theology.

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Tim asked me to introduce myself before contributing to this blog. So here goes…

I guess I’m young–although my wife has discovered a recent influx of white hairs on my head. And I guess I’m Anabaptist–although my parents had me baptized as an infant. But I don’t think anyone wants to include me among the “radicals” since I’m a pastor. Everyone knows that pastors aren’t radical. They are (we are) just pastors.

My name is Isaac Villegas and I pastor a Mennonite congregation in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. As I’ve discovered from wearing name tags at Mennonite conferences, my last name is a giveaway: my family tree isn’t rooted in Europe. My blood flows from south of the border. I’m the child of Catholic immigrants from Latin America who settled in Los Angeles, California. My ecclesial story meanders through various traditions. But my first memory of church is set in a modern cathedral, with lavishly adorned priests walking down the center aisle, incense wafting through the rows, and Christ’s transubstantiated presence beckoning from the altar of eucharistic mysteries.

But my family was pentecostal Catholic at heart, and that kind of hybrid Catholicism didn’t happen in our LA neighborhoods. So we turned to the anarchic pentecostal and storefront charismatic movements. Then evangelicals took hold of me during college. But they left me high and dry when I wrestled with the need for a faithful response to 9/11. The Mennonites saved my faith; they offered a communal witness of peace that took seriously the bible and the miracle-working power of the Holy Spirit.

I moved to North Carolina to help start a house of hospitality called the Rutba House. When we discovered that lots of other folks were doing the same things, we invited everyone we could think of to Durham for a conversation on “a new monasticism.” (If you want more information, we put together a book of essays: Schools for Conversion: 12 Marks of a New Monasticism.)

While I experimented with what we were calling “neo-monasticism,” I worshiped with the good people at Chapel Hill Mennonite. They taught me how to do church Mennonite-style–granted, a grass roots (i.e., radical?) variety of Mennonite that makes most sense to me. And for some crazy reason they thought it was a good idea to call me as their pastor. Only the Holy Spirit does stuff that crazy.

Greetings,

So recently YAR has had introductions from the The Reluctant Christian and The Impossible Anabaptist. So in the spirit of things, allow me to introduce myself as The Unexpected Pastor (To Be). I say “unexpected” because I never expected that I eventually would work on my MDiv at Eastern Mennonite Seminary. I never expected that I would want to be pastor. And in the darkest days of my disbelief and disorientation, I never thought I would want to be a Christian. However, since I graduated from Goshen College six years ago, I’ve had these quiet tugs pull me into this direction. Is this God? Is this insanity? Is this proof that God has a sense of humor?

I live with my wife Maegan and the expected Baby Yoder in Baltimore. We attend North Baltimore Mennonite Church, which currently is experiencing a lot of change since our pastor retired at the end of December. I feel change is a good thing — we needed to shake up status quo. There are good people in this community, but there are a lot of problems and divisions as well. Like a lot of urban Mennonite churches, there is broad theological/political diversity in the congregation and we have to somehow find a way to get along together.

What else? I grew up in Berlin, Germany and Evanston, IL. I am an alum of Reba Place Church and was there from 1988 to 1995. Reba’s has had a significant impact on me and what I feel churches should strive for. We attended Reba’s 50th Anniversary last summer and I it felt good to reconnect with Reba’s vision. (more…)

Well, to start off I actually only found this sight a couple days ago. My father said someone recommended it to him, and being the online blog/facebook person I am, he told me about it. So here I am.

Currently I am 17 (birthday was yesterday actually!), and am an MK (missionary kid) which I absolutely LOVE! Two years after I was born our family moved to Swaziland, Southern Africa for a 6 year term with MCC. At the end of that term we lived in Harrisonburg VA for 2 years while my parents went through seminary and then headed off on another 6 year term with MCC, this time to Philippines. I feel I have been really blessed by God for this experience to live and travel in other countries. It has given me a large world view, one that has really helped me see things in perspective. I really love getting into discussions with others who have had similar experiences as I, and just sharing the knowledge and culture I have attained as well as always learning new things. (more…)