Mennonites in Ontario
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We Worship Part 1
When I was a church-planting pastor under the Home Mission Board, I planned and led many worship services, generally imitating the patterns in the Missionary Churches I knew (mainly Lakeshore in North Bay, Evangel in Kitchener and Riverside in Toronto).… Continue reading
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How Sunday Schools Progressed in the Ontario Conference
As I mentioned in the previous blog about EMCC Sunday Schools, the United Mennonite merging conference in Bloomingdale, Waterloo County, Canada, in 1875, resolved “That Sunday schools shall be organized and supported by all our power.”1 As early as the… Continue reading
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Early EMCC Sunday Schools: Background
The EMCC Sunday School is in decline at this writing, judging by annual reports, or lack of them, from congregations. (Beginning in 1986, more and more EMCC congregations failed to report their statistics, especially their Sunday School numbers.) The form… Continue reading
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Levi and Fannie Raymer, Sunnidale Township, Simcoe County
Like Priscilla and Aquila in the Bible, Levi and Fannie Raymer stand out as married disciples of Christ in the history of the MBiC in Ontario. What they left behind intrigues me. First, Fannie Raymer (1844-1927) left a short manuscript… Continue reading
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A Speculation About Theodore Roosevelt
Sometime before 1947, when the Mennonite Brethren in Christ changed its name to the United Missionary Church, a certain “Mrs W J Sproule” donated a book to the “Stayner Mennonite [ie MBiC] S. S.” That was very kind of her.… Continue reading
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Mergers That Didn’t Happen Part 1
As the old joke goes, “Put two [you name the religious group] in a room and you will get three opinions.” Baptists, Jews, Mennonites, et al– humans are prone to divide. Websites on the internet claim there are about 44,000… Continue reading
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UFO Politician: The Honourable Beniah Bowman
Beniah Bowman had a new job from October 1918: he was elected to the provincial legislature as the honourable member for Manitoulin in a by-election for the United Farmers of Ontario, (UFO—changed in connotation now!) He was their first elected… Continue reading
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Christmas in the Church
Since my family didn’t begin attending the United Missionary Church until I was 11, my earliest memory of a Christmas church celebration is from the United Church of Canada. If the United Churches my family attended held Christmas pageants or… Continue reading
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UFO Politician: Preacher Beniah Baer Bowman
Mennonites in the 19th century were leery of politics and discouraged their members from participating in political parties, or standing for election. In the Mennonite Brethren in Christ Church, there was no hard rule about it; members did get involved… Continue reading
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Lodges and Fraternal Societies
North American Mennonites and Brethren in Christ1 mainly applied non-swearing of oaths2 to rejecting membership in “oath-bound secret societies.”3 In Ontario, this put them at odds with their non-Mennonite neighbours. Nearly every settlement in the province had one lodge or… Continue reading
EMCC History 