Young Anabaptist Radicals

Tag Archive: Introductions

Introducing Rusty…

Greetings everyone,

I am the newest contributor to the YAR blog, and as is the custom here, I was asked to introduced myself. I won’t bore you with my life story. I’ll keep it short and relevant.

My life is a complex journey, as all of ours tend to be in this day and age. I am a suburban southern kid who was raised during the corporate take over my once rural town. I watched the wild playground of my youth become paved and replaced with shopping malls. All the tree forts and hideouts we built as kids were replaced one-by-one with ‘real’ shelters, housing wealthy neighbors with well-manicured lawns. The whole infrastructure of my town shifted, and slowly, so did the income level and mindset of my family. The innocence of my youth was not only interrupted by all the normal challenges of adolescence, but also the rising consciousness of suburbia, consumerism, wealth, competition… capitalism.

For years I have been trying to forget what I know and remember what life was like before the corporate takeover of my town and my mind. Isn’t this the journey we are all on, trying to reconnect with our primal selves, our young innocence, our wide-eyed hope? This search has brought me so many places, literally and figuratively. I am currently living in Chicago, the third largest city in the country. I hate it. It’s a big concrete jungle, devoid of anything wild or natural. What keeps me here is the community house that I live in. But as the winter moves in, I will be moving out and navigating back to Florida, where I grew up.  I thrive in wild spaces, under stars, below trees. Though, I will say that as a student of herbal medicine, I love seeing tough healing plants rising between the cracks of abandoned factories. It gives me a glimpse of the coming kingdom of god. “A tree shall sprout in the middle of the city, and it’s leaves shall bring healing.” Revelation 22:2 (more…)

October 1, 2009 Biographical, Read more >

Introductions

Hello.  My name is Josh.  And I am an Anabaptist.

Well, pretty sure anyway.  Theres only a small number of people using the label of Anabaptism is Australia, tho many more exploring the traditions and those related to it.

I came to anarchism and anabaptism through a marrying of my activism and earlier evangelicalism.

My wife and I live in a small community in Perth called Peace Tree.  Peace Tree has been around since ’04, living in a forgotten neighbourhood trying to work out how to live as Christians in a society more interested in security and money.  Our community is small, a max population of 8, but perhaps 20 with sympathizers.

My wife (Amy) and I are actually away from home at the moment as well.  We’ve been 5 months in Timor Leste (me working on a Permaculture garden and Amy mostly teacing english).  This coming weekend we go the UK for 5 months and are keen to catch up with communities and like minded ppl.  I came across this blog trying to find out what is happening (I saw another community member – Jarrod Mckenna – being written about as well).  So, yeah, hello – I like coffee and gardening.

Peace

Joshua

September 4, 2009 Biographical Read more >

An Introduction

[NB: This post originally served as my “application” to YAR, and Tim thought it would be good for me to share with you all as well.]

Hi. My name is David Cramer, and I’m the newest member of the Young Anabaptist Radicals.

I’m young because I’m 25 and because I’ve only been Anabaptist for about the last 2 of those 25 years. Before that I attended a church and a college (the Missionary Church / Bethel College, IN) with Anabaptist roots that were remembered by only a few. I still worship in that denomination and now teach at that college and have become one of the few that remember those Anabaptist roots.

It was during my time in seminary at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School that I began to realize, much to the chagrin of many of my professors, I’m sure, that Christianity didn’t make much sense without an Anabaptist Christology and ecclesiology. I have since formalized those thoughts through much reading of John Howard Yoder and the like.

I blog somewhat frequently at http://cramercomments.blogspot.com/, which has been featured on Christian Century blogs (www.ccblogs.org) and elsewhere. My blog traces my subtle transition from a standard-stock Arminian evangelical to an Anabaptist (with an Arminian-evangelical flavor). I have yet to do much explicit blogging on Anabaptism, as I am still learning the ins and outs. Since finishing seminary and moving back from Chicago to Northern Indiana, I have, however, started a local group called the Evangelical Anabaptist Revolution (EAR), which includes other Bethel grads, some Associate Mennonite Biblical Seminary students, and a miscellany from Goshen College, Grace College, etc. If anyone is interested in joining the Revolution, just let me know. (Currently we exist as a “hidden” facebook group, so I would have to befriend and then invite anyone interested.)

My primary interests are in moral theology and philosophy of religion, including nonviolence, gender issues, and religious pluralism. Look forward to interacting with you all.

Peace,

David

January 16, 2009 Blog, , , , , , Read more >