May 6thPrioritizing “Cultivating a Rooted and Open Anabaptist-Mennonite Identity”
This is the eighth in a series of reflections from Executive Minister Michael Pahl on our new MCM Vision & Mission Statement, approved at our 2026 Gathering.
Two seemingly competing desires emerged out of the listening process leading up to our new regional church Vision and Mission Statement. On the one hand, we want to remain clearly Anabaptist in our theology and practice, even specifically Mennonite. On the other hand, we want to be open to other ways of worshiping, believing, and living out a vibrant Christian faith.
These apparently contradictory desires are reflected in the first of our missional priorities outlined in the new statement: “Cultivate a shared Anabaptist-Mennonite identity among our congregations, rooted in the historic Mennonite tradition while being open to other expressions of faith and practice.”
You’ll notice the use of “seemingly” and “apparently” in those opening paragraphs. I’d suggest these two desires are not, in fact, in conflict, but rather that they simply reflect a healthy, humble faith.
Many of us may be in the stream of Anabaptist-Mennonite Christianity by accident of birth or geography. That is, we were born into this form of faith, or we married into it, or a Mennonite church was simply the closest one around when we started going to church. We may have (and hopefully we have) made that faith our own, but the reality is that if we were born or lived somewhere else, we might not be in this Anabaptist-Mennonite stream.
Some of us, though, chose to swim in this stream intentionally as adults. We don’t have the genealogical or cultural associations with “Mennonite” that many in Manitoba do. Rather, we have been drawn to this Anabaptist-Mennonite stream of Christianity because we find its theological or practical distinctives compelling.
There is, in fact, a growing interest in Anabaptism in North America and around the world. Some of this is specifically Mennonite; some of this is a more generic “Neo-Anabaptism.” Whatever the story, more and more people are drawn to Anabaptism because of its focus on following Jesus’ teachings and way of life, its emphasis on communal sharing of our lives and resources, its practical outworking in striving non-violently for justice and peace, and more.
These are the kinds of convictions and practices that are part of a “shared Anabaptist-Mennonite identity” which we want to “cultivate…among our congregations.” We find these aspects of faith and life compelling, and we don’t want to lose them—indeed, we want to strengthen them, to revive them where needed.
However, we do not want to hold these convictions with rigidity, as if there is only one way to live them out. Nor do we want to hold these convictions with arrogance, as if we alone have found the truth. We’ve seen, at times in our history, what it looks like when we hold our Mennonite-ness with rigidity or arrogance, and we don’t want that. Further, we’ve engaged with Christians of other traditions—and even people of other faiths or no faith—and we recognize that there is much we can learn from others.
And so, we stand in our Anabaptist-Mennonite faith and way of life, but we do so with arms open wide to embrace and honour Christians of other traditions and peoples of other faiths, and with our hands open to receive their gifts to us and to share our gifts with them. We are willing, even, to step out in a kind of “humbly confident faith” into our pluralistic world: confident in our faith and way of life, not because we think we’ve got it all figured out or we think it’s the only way, but because we ourselves are compelled by it; and yet humble in this confidence, knowing we have much we can learn, and need to learn, from others around us.
This posture can lead us, then, to find ways to work with other Christians, with people of other faiths and even no faith. We share the same longings as many other Christians and many across our human family—longings for peace, for economic and social equity, for healthy relationships, for the well-being of all people and all creation. For us as Mennonites, these longings are strongly tied to our desire to follow Jesus’ teachings and way of life. Yet we can work with others who are motivated for other reasons to see these longings fulfilled. Indeed, in our pluralistic yet divided world, we need to work with others if we want to see these become reality.
In all this, our goal is always to follow Jesus more faithfully in the world in which we find ourselves. May this indeed be so among us.