Latest Posts
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Peace and War and the EMCC
At the close of our youth fellowship meeting in North Bay, a young man came dressed in a uniform of the US Army. Several in our group knew him and gathered around, amazed. He was Canadian, about 19 years old,… Continue reading
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Troubled Borders
Does it matter where an EMCC General Assembly meets? Could the world take interest in any action or teaching of our church today? We grumble in many congregations about issues supported by current Canadian culture with which we disagree, but… Continue reading
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New Mennonite Church Part 3: Distinctives
While researching for the profiles of NMC preachers I wrote for GAMEO,1 I gradually drew a picture of their unique community. They were Ontario Mennonites, definitely, and they added other features for a made-in-Canada mix. Frequently, Anabaptists who liked the… Continue reading
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New Mennonite Church of Canada West and Ohio Part 2: Appointments, Preachers and Deacons
I last mentioned the New Mennonite Church in connection with their missionary society founded in 1859.1 The NMC, which existed from about 1849 to 1875, was a precursor Church to the EMCC. From the imperfect memory and perspective of the… Continue reading
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What Happened to the Manitoba Mission? Part 2
City Mission Workers Society. In the Mar/Apr 1905 Mennonite Brethren in Christ Canada Conference annual meeting, Henry Schlichter Hallman, the CMWS President, announced that he was posting Emma Hostetler and Mary Markle to Winnipeg, MB. I assume as part of… Continue reading
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What Happened to the Manitoba Mission? Part 1
Michael Haug’s mission. Winnipeg. As early as 1884, the newly formed Mennonite Brethren in Christ Church in Ontario turned its attention to Manitoba as a place for missionary work. (See EMCC History blog page for “Formation of the EMCC.”) Winnipeg… Continue reading
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City Mission Workers Society (Ontario)
Approved Ministering Sisters and Presidents. Janet (Douglas) Hall was the first accredited woman preacher in the EMCC’s antecedent churches. She was licensed in Indiana and Ohio in 1884, and in Ontario in the following year. During the next dozen years… Continue reading
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Huffman and Biblical Archaeology
Jasper Abraham Huffman’s book, Voices from Rocks and Dust Heaps in Bible Lands,1 was probably the first book of biblical archaeology I ever read. I was likely less than 14 when I read it, but by then I had certainly… Continue reading
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Women Preachers in the MBiC Part 4: Mariah Parr
Forgotten Women Preachers series [Dec 5 2025: I finally found the obituary for Maria Parr: see the end of the text for the summary.] Out of the 133 women who participated in the official ministry of the early EMCC in… Continue reading
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Harvey Weber Stauffer, Pastor
Like Harvey Stauffer, I did not last long in the pastorate. All fired up about church planting after Bible College, I and a handful of others tried to start an English-language church in Sudbury, ON, 1981-1984,1 and later I served… Continue reading
EMCC History 