Among ‘stormy seas of change,’ School for Leadership Training celebrates 50 years of supporting ministry

Posted on January 29, 2019 by Maren Hange


Approximately 200 pastors, ministers and laity attended the 50th annual School for Leadership Training Jan. 14-16 at Eastern Mennonite Seminary. Funded by the seminary’s Lilly Foundation “Thriving in Ministry” grant, the three-day event included workshops, seminars, worship and fellowship opportunities focused on serving in challenging times of “political upheaval and national divisions” in the country and “theological debates in our denominations, congregations and families,” said Brenda Martin Hurst, Lilly Grant director.

Participants came from 13 states and two countries, and represented nine denominations, including Mennonite, Quaker, Church of the Brethren, Disciples of Christ, Church of God of Christ, Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian and United Church of Christ.

Hurst and the planning committee selected Mark 4:35-41 as the guiding scripture.

“Navigating these times as followers of Jesus and church leaders does feel like charting unknown waters in a choppy and stormy sea,” Hurst said in her welcome. “The biblical story found in Mark 4 of the disciples crossing the story sea with Jesus seemed appropriate for our repeated hearing and reflection over these days.”

Maren Tyedmers Hange, co-pastor of Charlottesville Mennonite Church, painted a special piece of art, featuring an empty boat floating in storm-swept seas, for contemplation. The boat is “intentionally empty as a invitation to join Jesus there,” said Veva Mumaw, seminary admissions director and member of the planning committee.

John Pavlovitz, a keynote speaker during 2019 SLT, addresses attendees in Martin Chapel. (Photo by Andrew Strack)

Expanded worship opportunities throughout the three days led the gathered through interpretation and reflection on the scripture passage. Keynote addresses were provided by David Evans, associate professor of history and intercultural studies and the director of cross cultural programs at Eastern Mennonite Seminary; Sue Park-Hur, denominational minister for leadership development and transformative peacemaking for Mennonite Church USA; and John Pavlovitz, author and Methodist pastor.

Pavlovitz provided three keynotes, addressing parts of the scripture each day. A pastor for two decades, writer and activist from Wake Forest, North Carolina, Pavlovitz blogs about Stuff That Needs To Be Said. His books include A Bigger Table: Building Messy, Authentic, and Hopeful Spiritual Community (Westminster John Knox Press, 2017) and HOPE and Other Superpowers: A Life-Affirming, Love-Defending, Butt-Kicking, World-Saving Manifesto (Simon & Schuster, 2018).

In an “upsidedown world” that corrodes hope and faith, followers of Christ – seeking to embody the compassion modeled by Jesus, “to intercede on the behalf of people in need” – often feel anger and disillusionment.

“You have the eyes of Jesus and the heart of Jesus that moves you towards people who no one else knows, who everyone else avoids, who no one else hears,” Pavlovitz said. The “collateral damage” of moving with empathy towards those has to be acknowledged, but at the same time, the movement is the heart of the Gospel.

“Muslim bans, health care repeals, ICE raids, Nazis in the street, debating the value of a black life,” he said, “I feel completely inverted spiritually. I feel profoundly disoriented as a Christian…but disorientation means your faculties are intact, your mind is right, your heart is working properly, and your soul is keeping you human in profoundly inhuman times.”

Victor Gomez, superintendent of the Harrisonburg District of the United Methodist Church, presents a workshop during SLT. (Photo by Andrew Strack)

Pavlovitz suggested that the challenge for ministers and people of faith is “how to take that natural anger and channel it in to something redemptive and constructive … Can we find a transcendent Jesus? … Can we create a community where the full Jesus can be on display? I think we can. We have to embrace the activist, compassionate heart of Jesus with people who we would not otherwise be with, in places we would not think to be.”

Acknowledgements

In addition to Brenda Martin Hurst and Veva Mumaw, the planning committee included Dale Detweiler, pastor, Birch Grove Mennonite Church, Port Allegany, Pennsylvania; Peggy Packard, pastor of Weyers Cave United Methodist Church, Weyers Cave, Virginia; Dawn Ranck-Hower, pastor of New Holland Mennonite Church, of New Holland, Pennsylvania; and Danilo Sanchez, co-pastor, Ripple-Allentown, and associate pastor, Whitehall Mennonite Church, Allentown, Pennsylvania.

The worship planning team included Perry Blosser, Maren Tyedmers Hange, Matthew Hunsberger, Robert Michalides, Veva Mumaw and Ryan Scarberry.

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Louisville Institute Pastoral Study Project Grant 2019

Posted on December 24, 2018 by Maren Hange
https://louisville-institute.org/awards/pastoral-study-project/14283/

August 2017 and its aftermath have awoken me to the systemic racism in my community. I have engaged in the ongoing community and religious work through the Charlottesville Clergy Collective and the Women’s Clergy Circle in Charlottesville.

Despite a history of peace and justice initiatives in the Mennonite tradition, I have encountered white privilege and the silence that creates when addressing this issue based on my experience as clergy addressing white supremacy rallies in Charlottesville. Thus I want to engage in reflection and conversation with three leaders in Peace & Justice studies in the Mennonite denomination.

Because systemic racism is a communal issue I want to approach it with a communal eye by tapping into the Charlottesville Clergy Collective and the Women’s Clergy Circle through conversations with twelve faith leaders in Charlottesville and their stories.

My experience is calling me to explore the question from different perspectives and modalities, such as Nonviolent Communication, collective narrative and watercolor painting, in order to gain an understanding about how each might inform my future work within the Mennonite Church. To engage the issue of racism by building the capacity to break silence and engage the issues of power and privilege, we need to find new creative ways to open up spaces for conversations.

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CMC pastor’s radio and TV interviews on peacebuilding

Posted on December 3, 2018 by Roy Hange

Radio and TV interviews on local and international peacebuilding

with Roy Hange in 2017 and 2018*

On August 12, 2017 racial and legacy conflict in Charlottesville:

“Roy Hange: Peacebuilding in Charlottesville” - June 6, 2017 

http://wina.com/podcasts/roy-hange-peacebuilding-in-charlottesville/

 Roy Hange: “Post Rally Peace-building in Charlottesville” - August 14, 2017

http://wina.com/podcasts/roy-hange-post-rally-peace-building-in-charlottesville/

Tensions in Charlottesville on Jefferson’s Birthday | Roy Hange - April 13, 2018 

http://wina.com/podcasts/tensions-in-charlottesville-on-jeffersons-birthday-roy-hange/

Charlottesville Right Now with Les Sinclair: July 17, 2018 – “Preempting Charlottesville’s August 12th Anniversary”

http://wina.com/podcasts/preempting-charlottesvilles-august-12th-anniversary-roy-hange/

Rob Schilling Show/July 11, 2018, “One year anniversary of August 12 preview” from minute 20 and following of this link:

http://wina.com/podcasts/schilling-show-7-11-18-hour-2-paul-robbins-roy-hange/

On the Syrian War:

TV Interview:

Roy Hange on the Coy Barefoot Program | April 30, 2017 | S2E16

The Center for Media and Citizenship at the University of Virginia

https://video.wvpt.net/video/roy-hange-mkbfw8/

or

Radio Interview

On the Syrian Civil War  Coy Barefoot interview on 94.7 FM   April 17, 2017   
http://insidecville.com/world/roy-hange-4-17-17/

 also at:  Roy Hange on Citizens Band Radio | April 2017

On MJ Sharp’s death while working for the United Nations:

Mar 29, 2017 - Roy Hange, with MCC joins Dori Zoook (WINA NEWS) and Les Sinclair to discuss Faith-based Peace-building, the same thing Michael J.Sharp…

https://wina.com/podcasts/mennonite-central-committee/

*Roy Hange taught the course "The Prospect of Peacebuilding in the Middle East and South Asia" as an adjunct at the University of Virginia in the spring of 2012 and does not have an ongoing adjunct role there. Roy taught the course "Faith Based Peacebuilding" as an adjunct at Eastern Mennonite University's Summer Peacebuilding Institute for nine years.

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Who is the God I worship?

Posted on August 23, 2018 by Maren Hange

The faith that moves mountains counts on the impossible and knows how to read the signs of the times that announce the possibility of a new tune instead of the old refrain.                Eboussi Boulaga, Cameroonian Philosopher

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Stephen Colbert might have smiled and cried on Palm Sunday 33 AD

Posted on March 24, 2013 by Roy Hange

The popular Irish Catholic comedian Stephen Colbert often sets up frames of understanding as a part of his humor. He frames a situation and invites folks to look through the frame with new eyes as he smiles at the implications he does not name...and we laugh.

The triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem sets up a similar frame where, if we have eyes to see, we can hold the humorous and tragic tension of that event as naming the power of God to transform.

The video "Palm Sunday" by Marcus Borg describes the two triumphal entries that happened on Palm Sunday:

One procession up from the western coast town of Caesarea with a reinforcement of Roman troops for the Passover (read Jewish liberation from Egypt ceremony) in Jerusalem to keep the peace of the empire’s interests (read liberation not welcome).

And, the other from the east with entry of Jesus followed by crowds and children (read another kind of liberation) with a Messiah on a donkey! The vivid contrast of these processions could have been perceived by persons in the first century as a comic contrast with a tragic result:

Marcus Borg: Palm Sunday

http://bcove.me/hepw91sr (not responsible for advertisement before video)

I referred to the tension of these two different entries in my sermon “Nazareth Jesus and the Temple of Doom”

http://www.pvmcsermons.com/2011/09/roy-hange-nazareth-jesus-and-temple-of.html

A part of this sermon focuses on the post Pentecost encounter between the disciple Peter (Acts 10) with the Roman centurion from Caesarea who most probably led, or was a part of, that procession from the west toward Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. Their reconciling encounter completed through "good news" the tension that was set up in the gospel of Luke as described by Borg.

Peter then says what the crowds could not see on Palm Sunday: I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation those who fear God and do what is right are acceptable to him.  (Acts 10:34-35)

These links follow on our church’s informal sermon theme from last year of how most readings of scripture in the early centuries would have included a Stephen Colbert smile…at the implications of what was not said but meant to be seen in the original context.

In reading scripture we often take a literal reading of the "window frames" and miss the window into that culture’s challenges that the frame is highlighting. When we see the deeper meaning we can see the power of the Word in our own time also.

Which Palm Sunday will we remember? One, aren’t those children cute waving their palm branches? Or two, how many children have the empires of this world sacrificed this year by not following the way of the Lord Jesus?

I think this is why Jesus wept over Jerusalem before entering it “Oh Jerusalem would that you knew what made for peace.” (Luke 19:41ff.) The one who comes in the name and way of the Lord brings blessings of peace we do not expect.

Stephen Colbert could also have wept over a reading about Palm Sunday 33 AD as occupation and exile were his family's story. Yet, he names how the pain of remembering what the British Empire did to his Irish ancestors before they were forced to emigrate is turned into laughter in this video link while naming that his wife’s ancestors got land taken from his family by the British Empire:

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/facesofamerica/profiles/stephen-colbert/11/

I can imagine the disciple Peter and the centurion Cornelius sharing a grace filled laugh as they reflected on what brought them to the meal that day in Acts 10. Cornelius could have had Peter killed or imprisoned if Peter had not denied Jesus. Peter would have readily cut off the ear of Cornelius...or more. The work of the Spirit brought them together eventually in transforming reconciliation.

Waiting in hope for these grace filled eventualities is why peacemakers are called blessed. They do not react to one tragedy by creating another violent tragedy.

They do so standing in the River of Life that flows from the throne of God. That same river that flowed through the cross of Jesus Christ "breaking down dividing walls of hostility." (Ephesians 2).

So, we are called in faith to hold this foolish hope. The alternatives are not much better.

by Roy Hange

 

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When Restorative Justice Goes to Prison (upcoming webinar!)

Posted on March 14, 2013 by Shinay Henderson

On March 25th at 4:30 EST, the Zehr Institute at the Center for Justice & Peacebuilding will be hosting a webinar on the topic of restorative justice.

Topics to be covered will be:

  • What relevance does restorative justice have within a prison environment?
  • What are the possibilities, and what are the challenges or pitfalls?
  • What happens when restorative values are juxtapositioned with the retributive and control-oriented values that predominate in prison?
  • Who should take the lead in promoting restorative justice there?
  • What do prison-based programs look like?
  • Are there differences in the way it is articulated and received in prison as compared to the work outside?

The webinar will be hosted by two people deeply involved in restorative justice work:

Tyrone Werts was sentenced to life in prison in 1975. In Pennsylvania, where he was sentenced, life means life and commutations are exceedingly rare. In the early 1990s, he was part of the first restorative justice program at Graterford prison. For many years, Tyrone was president of the Lifer’s Organization and provided leadership to many other initiatives in prison. Then, after 37 1/2 years, Tyrone’s sentence was commuted in recognition of his outstanding integrity and accomplishments. Since March 2011, he has been on the outside, working with the public defender’s office and with the Inside Out Prison Exchange Program that allows college students and prisoners to study together.

Barb Toews is a long-time restorative justice practitioner and trainer. She was director of a restorative justice program in Lancaster, Pa., before joining the graduate program at CJP. After graduating, she worked for a number of years developing and facilitating restorative justice initiatives, often in collaboration with incarcerated individuals, in Pennsylvania prisons with the Pennsylvania Prison Society. She is now completing her PhD, focusing on the privacy, well-being and the design of correctional facilities. She teaches at Bryn Mawr College and Haverford College, where she uses the Inside Out Prison Exchange Program model. She is author of The Little Book of Restorative Justice for People in Prison and co-editor of Critical Issues in Restorative Justice.

You will need to register for this webinar and you can do so here!

For additional information, see their web site.

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Why Mennonite?

Posted on March 4, 2013 by Roy Hange

Why Mennonite? Why Anabaptist?

There are more than 57 varieties of Christians so why Mennonite? Throughout this blog are some links to speakers who go more in depth in an easy to listen to style.

Mennonite emphases include:

1--Focusing on a lived faithfulness by following Jesus in daily life through worship, service, stewardship, fellowship and community life. Prof. Heidi Miller Yoder focuses on whole life faithfulness:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1W-YZDba0c

2-Attempting to remain a peace church in various violent cultures over the ages while holding the vision of scriptures and the Early Church of being “ambassadors of reconciliation” through peacemaking– Professor Ron Sider on the Early Church and violence:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIfMwGqeZ58

3-Having the practice of believers’ baptism, in contrast to infant baptism, led the early followers to be called “re baptizers,” or Anabaptist, and created a community that could hold together enemy love, holding Jesus as an example and living simply.  Mega church pastor Greg Boyd at Woodland Hills Church in Minneapolis explains the power of Anabaptist church life and theology: “On Anabaptism”

http://media.whchurch.org/2013/2013-02-17_Boyd_Ana-What.mp3

A direct link to the recording:

media.whchurch.org/2013/2013-02-17_Boyd_Ana-What.mp3

4- Being the church as a visible Kingdom Community.  Following is a contemporary introduction to Anabaptism and its distinctions from Protestant and Catholic ways of holding faith. The speaker, Bruxy Cavey, is the pastor of an Anabaptist church in Toronto, The Meetinghouse, which is one of the largest and most innovative churches in Canada. “Anabaptist Invasion”

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxc-DVDnyEM

5- Being a church that came out of the radical wing of the Reformation which called for the separation of church and state…a few hundred years before Thomas Jefferson and the Enlightenment thinkers did. The other churches remained state churches where belief and geography were fused.  In this sermon I highlight how Dutch Mennonites were essential in forming the vision for the separation of church and state in Western culture—“A Community that Dances in the Wind of the Spirit”

http://www.pvmcsermons.com/2013/01/roy-hange-community-that-dances-in-wind.html

6-Being open to creative relationships with other Christian traditions. Within the last ten years there have been reconciling encounters and processes with church traditions that used to persecute the Anabaptists including Reformed, Lutheran and Roman Catholic. These relationships are facilitated by the Interchurch Relations department of Mennonite Church USA.

http://mennoniteusa.org/executive-board/interchurch-relations/

Our church in Charlottesville has a range of creative ecumenical relationships with other churches in town.

By Roy Hange

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Lent 2013: Temptation and Wilderness

Posted on February 26, 2013 by Maren Hange

Two weeks ago I had lunch with a friend. As we were talking, I mentioned that I was preaching that Sunday. Her response was ‘Lent 1, of course the temptation.’ And then she reflected how she had heard a speaker once who connected the temptation and the Lord’s prayer.

We pray each week “…and do not lead us into temptation” and yet that is exactly what happened to Jesus after the glorious moment of emerging from the river Jordan at his baptism “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22b). Jesus is led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. From that wilderness Jesus emerged into ministry as the Son of God and proclaimed “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed to free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4:18-19).

How did Jesus come to that understanding? How did he know what he was called to do? How did he know how to be the son of God?  It appears formation happened through temptation. Jesus worked out his calling in the wilderness where he was tempted to falsely use his power and his role. Jesus’ calling is for the sake of the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed. But the devil tempts Jesus to use his power as Son of God to serve his own needs and self-centered desires by satisfying his own hunger, by using his ruling authority and seeking to proof his invulnerability.

Wilderness time is a time to sort things out. The wilderness was a place where Israel itself was birthed as a people, where habits formed by slavery in Egypt were discarded and new ways of complete trust in God were formed. The wilderness was a place where prophets like Moses and Elijah began their ministries, where John the Baptist was nurtured, where the Word of God came to him and where he began preaching. The Wilderness is a place that Jesus withdrew to after a flurry of activities, a time of healings and teachings, to be restored, re-centered, renewed (Luke 4:42) and a place to pray (Luke 5:16).

Lent gives us the opportunity to enter the wilderness of our lives, and examine where we are tempted, ask ourselves what stones do we turn into bread, how do we satisfy or ease our hunger,  who do we worship and serve, and where are we tempted into invulnerability?

The questions in our lives remain: When are we ever famished? Or better, when do we ever stop long enough to notice that we are actually famished? Our lives are too full, too busy creating their own kind of wilderness. What if for forty days we would turn our busy lives into empty spaces? What if we found one way to simplify our lives, create space, turn off what fills up our time in meaningless ways and turn to God.  Forty days to stop and pause and really look and see who and what diverts us from becoming who God calls us to be. What keeps us from following God’s vision for our lives?

Let us remember who we are as a people of faith, not what we are to do, but who we are and how we are connected to God. And that is what Lent is all about, the transforming power in remembering, repenting, reconnecting to God, the source of all life.

Maren Tyedmers Hange has served as co-pastor of Charlottesville Mennonite Church for 14 years after spending 5 years in the Middle East under Mennonite Central Committee. She is a graduate of  Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary. She loves to travel, play board games, read widely, and roast coffee.  

 

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Beginnings and Vision Statements

Posted on January 12, 2013 by Roy Hange

***

I welcome you to the blog for Charlottesville Mennonite Church! Our hope is that this blog will provide you a flavor of the spirit of our fellowship, encouraging deeper reflection and fostering conversation. The following is a meditation on personal visions.--RH

Each of us moves through life with a script or vision we either hold before ourselves or one that holds us without our being aware of it.

Much of the scriptures hold stories of leaders inviting awareness of negative scripts or evoking a life giving vision in faithfulness.

Our church’s recent journey through advent and epiphany was a walk with the scripts in our lives held up against the vision of the good news in Jesus the Messiah. On a recent sabbatical I revised my own ministry vision statement (below) and I invite readers to do the same within a sense of their own vocation.

We each do so with a sense of our own brokenness held in God’s grace. These are not statements about anyone’s perfection but a vision for focusing our energies in a world with many demands of time for lesser things.

Ministry Vision Statement for Roy Hange:

As a servant of the church, I daily strive to join with the mystery of the Spirit’s work in our broken world as an agent of God’s vision, healing and hope. Held in the grace and peace of God in Jesus Christ, I invite others to know and be held by this mystery of a salvation graciously offered for all to be strengthened in their inner being.

Empowered by the Spirit and accountable to others, I will to offer my giftedness in preaching, teaching, pastoral care and counseling for the healing of persons. I will hold these gifts within transformative and peacebuilding ministries at personal, social and political levels for the healing of the nations. All this is to honor the One “who by the power at work in us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.”

***

Roy Hange has served as co-pastor of Charlottesville Mennonite Church for 14 years after spending ten years in Egypt, Syria and Iran under Mennonite Central Committee at various times during the 80's and 90's. He is a graduate of Eastern Mennonite University and Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary. He works in church oversight for the Harrisonburg District of Virginia Mennonite Conference.  He has also taught courses in peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University and the University of Virginia. 
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