Stories and a Global Anabaptism
I’m thinking about stories because of the Young Anabaptist Radicals website. We, as young Anabaptists, are doing good work on that website. Most of the work, it has recently been pointed out, is analytical. Resultantly, there has been a flurry of discussion about the importance of story and some sharing of the stories themselves. I’m thinking about global Anabaptism because I’m cycling around Southeast Asia and talking with people about Anabaptism – well, more often, Christianity, but I’ll get to that. This post is about stories, but it’s still analytical in content…‘so there,’ or ‘sorry’…here’s what I’m thinking:
I’ve gotten fairly cynical, here, about some ‘global Anabaptism.’ Primarily, I’ve become cynical about the one that was dreamed up for me last summer by BikeMovement USA. Then, as now, we were fundraising for and talking energetically about a goal of more closely relating global Anabaptist communities. I imagined, with the consent of a small community, a global Anabaptist church that never ultimately shared the same theologies, worship styles, understanding of church hierarchy, etc., but a global church that challenged itself toward valuing its internal differences – even to the point of shaping itself as a whole so that the theologies, worship styles, understandings of church hierarchies, etc. became similar, considering the contexts each sub-group existed. My vision was that an overarching, ‘global,’ Anabaptist Church would help to diversify and standardize more responsible (ethically, theologically, spiritually, historically) global Anabaptist communities. I wanted to call Anabaptist Christians in Indonesia “brothers and sisters” not only because we both appreciate the profundity of the work of Jesus, but because we also remember the work and theological implications of the 16th century Anabaptism and embody Holy Spirit worship through Cambodian-style ‘enthusiasm of the convert.’
The stories that I’m experiencing in Southeast Asia, though, don’t exactly fall into my great ‘global Anabaptist mega-church’ schema from last summer. Put simply, the churches here are interested in talking about different things than the churches in the US. Most of the time, I don’t think that we just arrive at different places about how worship should be done. The fact is that we start from completely different places and have completely different contexts for the shaping of our faiths. I have gotten to a point where I almost have the courage to say that US American and Canadian Anabaptists have one Christian faith journey to deal with and other Anabaptist communities deal with faith in completely different terms and completely different ‘times.’
I don’t think it means that we don’t pay attention to one another, but sometimes I think it would be healthier if we stopped kidding ourselves and calling one another by the same name. I’m Anabaptist, at least partially, because I appreciate the history of the Anabaptist movement. To push that on the rest of the world is somehow Eurocentric, but it’s also true that the original movement happened in a socio-political setting that was Europe. It can be translated into other times and places – that’s what committed Anabaptists do in the US and Canada each time they reflect on their faith. But what historical similarities are necessary to make the ‘jump?’ And when – in terms of faith community maturity – are various churches ready to apply concepts of Anabaptist faith to their own contexts? Phnom Penh Mennonite (in Cambodia), for instance, is just working with different questions than most churches in what I’ve been perhaps sloppily generalizing as ‘the US American and Canadian Mennonite church.’ If I were running things, I might hesitate in calling them Mennonite or Anabaptist – or letting them call themselves Mennonite or Anabaptist without some form of commitment to some Mennonite/Anabaptist ‘standard’ (which, admittedly, someone still needs to develop – unless we just want to go with Schleitheim). The fact is, and my point comes down to, that the things that I believe make me Anabaptist and get me excited about that faith story seem almost completely irrelevant for Cambodian Mennonites – maybe Southeast Asian Anabaptists in general. And I won’t even get into what it might’ve meant for early Anabaptists to commit to being a part of the Anabaptist community…
Anyway…there are some thoughts. What are yours?
Tim Showalter
21 May 2007
Vientiane, Laos
May 28th, 2007 at 7:02 pm
I think I agree Tim, in most ways. Despite my best efforts, I find it hard to find meaningful commonalities among the faiths (and the accompanying faith stories) of Anabaptists in such radically different parts of the world. Looking across cultures, I often don’t recognize much that, according to MY experience of Anabaptism, I would call distinctly Anabaptist.
[Of course, I wonder if the 16th century radicals would express similar observations if they biked across the United States in the 21st century.]
But before I get too comfortable in my discomfort with current expressions of Global Anabaptism, I have to ask questions which (though they’ve been asked many times already), so far, I don’t have the tools to answer.
First: What ARE the essentials of Anabaptism? What is the core? Or, what are the boundaries? There are many potential answers to this question, each of which might suggest a different posture toward Anabaptism across borders. One possible answer — one which might allow/encourage us to be more open in our definitions of what constitutes “authentic” Anabaptism — has to do with the sources of Christian theology and authority. If a significant part of the CORE of Anabaptism was (and is) a commitment to the Bible as, in some sense, the primary source of our theology, our ethics, our community, etc., then some of the cultural (even historical) peculiarities of North American and European Anabaptism can be relativized in the name of a common pursuit of faithful, Biblical faith, wherever we might find ourselves. Our history - the story we all share - is not the genealogy of Sattler and Simons, but the history of the Church calling itself back to its origins in the biblical vision of a community seeking to respond faithfully to Jesus Christ. But even here we run into difficulties: This definition of Anabaptist essence may perhaps be so broad as to render “Anabaptism” into a relatively meaningless term; and it may somewhat ahistorically redefine the particularities of the Anabaptist story. Furthermore, and on the other hand, your current experiences with Anabaptist communities in SE Asia may suggest to you that those churches don’t even fit into the schema of a global community calling itself back to biblical faith and practice centered on the life, work, and identity of Jesus. [Do ours?] Anyways, the point is, there may be a variety of ways to answer the questions “what is Anabaptism? and Who is an Anabaptist?” I don’t know what the answers are, but certainly they will have drastic implications for our understandings of the emerging Global Anabaptism.
Second: Where does “Anabaptist history” begin and end? When you say “I’m Anabaptist, at least partially, because I appreciate the history of the Anabaptist movement,” what exactly do you mean? To me, it might mean that you recognize (and appreciate) that our current communities and our professed theologies are products of a dynamic interaction between contemporary culture and the history of the Church, which (in our case) took a momentous formative step in Europe in the 16th century. This affirmation assumes the reality that HISTORY GOES ON. The Anabaptist movement did not “happen” so much as it is “happening.” If we (in North America) can affirm that we are in a historical stream that was shaped profoundly by the early Radical Reformers, then we must also affirm that we are a part of a moving, dynamic, changing movement - one that does not simply “begin” with Felix Mantz and Conrad Grebel, nor abruptly “end” with those of us in North America who still remember them. The stream goes on. And as it is effected by the changing landscape (and hopefully shapes a little of the landscape as it moves along), it may inevitably become a bit less recognizable to those who stood in it 400 years ago. But won’t it be the same stream? Even if it forgets where it came from, can it still be considered the same stream?
Yeah, but I’m not sure. I resonate deeply with you, Tim; and your current experience is richer than mine (I’m still in my PJ’s, sitting at a table-clothed kitchen table in Virginia). And besides, I’m sure I made all sorts of errors, imposing certain presuppositions, misunderstanding history, misperceiving the present, and failing to see from all sorts of vantage points. But that’s the nature of the beast, I suppose. We can only hope that mine isn’t the last word…
May 29th, 2007 at 4:38 pm
Tim,
Solid reflections. I appreciate your honesty here, willingness to reconsider even things we seemed to value. And with Luke’s post I’m reminded about the importance of framing or the lenses we use to interpret.
I’m reminded of a famous saying of Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci, calling for “pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will.” It seems like that’s part of what’s going on in this discussion, being skeptical about the sufficientness of what exists but also interested in the prospect of things having potential nevertheless. Probably an oversimplication, but one way that has helped me grapple with troubling complexity and cynicism.
Perhaps for insight we might turn to questions arising from statements Tim made last summer… >
Draft of some questions from the study guide that will accompany the soon-to-be-released documentary on BikeMovement USA:
2. Tim Showalter sees that captial “T” truths are hard for to talk about for a number of young adults. ~ What “Truths” do you all feel uncomfortable with? Is there agreement in the group? Is coming to agreement the point? If multiple views exist, how might the church or members respond?
[These seem like questions perhaps applicable to the situation in the thread…]
Also,
5. Tim Showalter asks, “What if churches forgot about buildings?” ~ What would it look like to de-emphasize a church building? Is your church active outside its walls?
1. Tim Showalter talks about times away from comfortable living – like biking – as enormous growing experiences. ~ What are growing experiences for you? How does that impact how you do (or want to do) church?
As you may guess, I’m trying to check in with you Tim to see how you feel about these questions citing you being included in the study guide. (Don’t worry, plenty of other folks get shout-outs too, some more than you.)
I didn’t know how often you have access to/time to read email, but wanted to give this a shot to see if you can give a “yea,” “nay,” or alteration suggestions by Thursday morning my time (Thursday evening your time) when Denver and I are sending this to the printer. Responding either here or to me at shenkja(at)earlham.edu would work.
So, here’s to strange time-warps in the thread, and continuing to check our perceptions.
Jason
p.s. I’ll also include Neil’s citations here, just in case:
4. Neil Richer notes that many people assume all young adults are saying the same thing, when there’s actually such a wide variety even in the Mennonite Church. ~ What are young adults you know saying about church? How does that compare to what’s shared in the film?
4. Speaking of the tendancy to avoid biblical or religious language, Neil Richer suggests that we lose something if we can’t describe our experience. ~ What might be drawbacks of avoiding religious language? What’s meaningful to you when you do use such ways of talking?
May 30th, 2007 at 1:24 am
These are great thoughts/observations, Tim, and good responses by Luke and Jason. I’d echo Tim’s initial point that these and other important topics are being discussed over on the Young Anabaptist Radicals website. In fact, just this morning I wrote a shabby response to Tim’s post on the same topic on that website. I won’t copy the entire thing here because I hope you’ll just go there and read it anyway. I agree with you, Tim, that there are so many differences that maybe we shouldn’t pretend to use the same name — or perhaps using Anabaptist instead of Mennonite when referring to the global Anabaptist community. But in any case, I want to challenge the notion that “someone still needs to develop a Mennonite/Anabaptist ’standard’,” or that the Schleitheim Confession should become or ever was such a standard.
The early Anabaptists were explicit about being non-creedal/non-doctrinal, and the Schleitheim Confession was certainly not a systematic theology or a standard of Anabaptist identity. It was a statement of shared convictions (notably only among the attending few male Swiss Mennonite elders), arguably much like the shared convictions published recently by Mennonite World Conference. But regardless of Schleitheim, I would argue that a strong characteristic of the Anabaptist tradition is specifically a discomfort with doctrine and an unwillingness to outline specific values or beliefs that succinctly describe what it means to be Anabaptist (or Mennonite). Obviously, as Luke implies, every group must have some understandings of their own identity to remain distinctive. But let’s not get carried away along the easy road of defining “core beliefs” or “boundaries” that only serve to stifle the dynamic life of this Anabaptism that is, as Luke pointed out, still happening.
Perhaps an emerging Anabaptist identity is to be found in the simple act of community discernment, as we speak to others who identify themselves using the same name we do, and we talk with them about why that is and what it means to them. It’s certainly messier this way, but it allows us to value our North American Mennonite identity without giving up entirely on the global Body of Christ.
(Again, I encourage you to read this same discussion–and a more developed version of my thoughts–over on the Young Anabaptist Radicals website. And add your own thoughts! But not to take away from this lively BikeMovementAsia discussion…)
May 30th, 2007 at 2:33 am
I resonate with your journal in a lot of ways, Tim, if only because I am always a bit more at home in the “stories” realm than the “analytical” one, as you well know. I’m glad you can, or try to, blend both together in this experience.
When I was in Cambodia, I remember feeling as if my faith, my excitement about the church, and my Mennonite identity felt far away and almost irrelevant. I didn’t feel strong connections, at least theologically, with other Christians there, and I had a hard time imagining how the values and beliefs of my particular community would really have any applicability in this foreign space. I think I sort of panicked in thinking that perhaps my faith is only relevant in a very specific space and community; that my Anabaptist and Mennonite identity cannot, after all, cross borders and tie me to people around the globe. I certainly would have agreed heartily with many of the questions you ask, Tim.
And I still ask them. But then two weeks after returning from Cambodia, I entered into an intense, three week exploration of the history of Anabaptist/Mennonite roots through a tour in Europe. And, yes, the history of that movement took place in a specific socio-political context, but as Luke points out, that context is just as if not more removed from our own context as that of Mennonites living across the globe today. And I have to wonder if Mennonties living in other parts of the world might have more in common with our Anabaptist ancestors than North American Mennonites do. But regardless, we are still connected with that history and those stories, even though the thread might be thin and barely recongizable at times, and I do think the thread running through all these years is a reason to hope.
My time in Europe studying Anabaptist history made me realize that the Anabaptist identity has never been clear cut or starkly defined, even in its earliest stages. Yes, we have Schleitheim to look back on, but unlike many denominations, we do not have a confession of faith that all Anabaptists adhere to. Like Tim, that feels incredibly frustrating to me at times. How do we define ourselves? What binds us together as Anabaptists? Where are our boundaries? But there is also something beautiful in coming from a tradition that has never had impermeable boundaries and has been able to hold together a multiplicity of perspectives under one name. Like John Roth said at the end of our course, when we allow ourselves to live between the tensions, there is space for something new and beautiful to be created. Of course, there needs to be some common core value to ground that creation as well, and that is where I run smack dab into Tim’s questions and wonder what values all Anabaptists might hold in all spaces and contexts. And I don’t have an answer.
But I hesitate to say we should then just begin calling ourselves by different names. Another thing I’ve realized recently is that we come from a church history of many divisions. Perhaps because of the absence of any strictly governed confession of faith, there have been many times in the Anabaptist history when groups have disagreed and felt that they had to split and take different names in order to hold true to their own values and sense of how to live most faithfully. It would be even easier and perhaps more legitimate to take those steps today, when what I value and what makes sense for faithful living in my context may not even make sense in a context across the globe. On paper and in my head, it makes much more sense to call myself something different than someone who lives in Asia or South America. But something in my gut tells me that we lose something of incredible value when we drop that connection with people around the globe; that Anabaptism in itself loses something when it no longer speaks to both the particular local congregation and to a global community of very different people in different times and spaces.
I don’t feel like I’ve really said anything. Sometimes I feel like I’m constantly struggling with this simultaeous desire to define boundaries and idenity as well as be open to a diversity of perspectives and ways of living. I think it’ll always be a question and I’m glad you’re asking it in this way, Tim. I’m just not ready to let go of a global Anabaptist church quite yet…
May 30th, 2007 at 4:01 am
As I\’ve biked with Tim and the rest of the gang, and engaged many of these same Christian communities, I\’ve also been considering many of these same questions. It\’s difficult to determine what it is that connects me, or my understanding of Anabaptist community to the places and people we continue to encounter. I resonate deeply with the many challenges each of you have touched on… how do we define boundaries while maintaining a spirit of inclusiveness? How do we sum up and claim an Anabaptist history that is so diverse, so full of schism, so ongoing and fluid? And who gets to do the defining (when, as we\’ve stated in our vision statement for this trip, the majority of Anabaptists live in the global south, and do not share the particular time or space or situatedness we continue to talk about)? … and I could go on, but i would only continue to rearticulate the thoughtful questions drawn out already…
All this repititious rambling to say that I\’m struggling to know what binds us, struggling to know how the very particular Anabaptism that I claim can be translated into the contexts which I\’m experiencing briefly here in Southeast Asia (particularities which, for the record, I often don\’t know how to translate or connect with other Anabaptists at home, either. But that takes us in yet another direction.)
I, like Krista, am not ready to give up on a global Anabaptist church. I do, however, need to be reminded of a few things. To start: given the diversity, the seeming lack of strong unifying threads, etc, etc, why do we continue our efforts to be one global Anabaptist body?? I have a few reasons, but I\’d like to hear (need to hear!) more from others…
May 30th, 2007 at 4:36 am
And since we are somewhere in this thread talking about story, here’s a taste of narrative from our travels that weaves its way into this conversation on global Anabaptism:
We spent several days with Eastern Mennonite Mission workers in Ubon Province, Thailand. Part of this visit included spending time with members of the local house churches that EMM has helped plant over the last 10 or so years. We visited their homes, learned to plow and plant rice paddies, helped pour a concrete floor in a new home, shared delicious meals, worshipped together. And during an English class that Addie and I took part in, after baking a cake and learning the vocab for kitchen utensils and ingredients, our conversation somehow turned to questions of faith… and countless stories could be pulled from this english-lesson-turned-all-afternoon-sharing-time, but I’ll leave you with one tid-bit:
I was struggling with these very questions of why I and these women and men in Det Udom, Thailand, are all somehow connected to this Anabaptist label. So I asked them: first if they considered themselves Mennonites or Anabaptists, and then, if so, why. At first the question barely resonated. No, they are Christians, simply put, in this Buddhist nation. But then something more is coming through the translator. They are reflecting on a speaker, some foreigner who came and talked about Anabaptist Mennonite history (and here I’m assuming history mostly about 400 years old). And then the response begins to change. Perhaps they do not call themselves by any name other than Christian, but they liked these stories. They really connected with the experience of the martyrs. They know what it is to live with persecution. In this context, to become a Christian, to decide to follow in the footsteps of Jesus is tantamount to rejecting one’s family, one’s ancestors, the dominant religion, infused as it is in all layers of culture and sociological dynamics in this highly communal context. For these people, choosing to commit themselves to the Christian church had resulted in shunning from their families and neighbours, marginalisation from the broader life of the community.
And here I must ask myself another question: is it I or them who’s life experience connects so closely with the lives of these early Anabaptist radicals?
May 31st, 2007 at 2:58 am
Great thoughts, all around. I posted a response yesterday that didn’t work for some reason, so I re-wrote another response today. Then Sheldon found my original response in the spam box of the server and posted it, so now I’ll add a few of the new things I wanted to say in my “version 2.0″.
I mainly want to add an “Amen” to Krista’s and Nicole’s recent comments — spot on. And on my earlier topic of doctrinal statements, John Roth had a good example: Lutherans worldwide can rally around the Augsburg Confession as their definition of Lutheran identity — if you can sign the confession, you’re in; if you can’t, you’re not a Lutheran. It’d be much simpler if we did that also (although I certainly hope we wouldn’t use Schleitheim as our defining statement), but I think there’s something extremely valuable in our historical hesitancy to reduce Anabaptist/Mennonite identity to a list of theological doctrines or ethical values (or cultural mannerisms, for that matter). Instead, we have to constantly remain in discussion with those worldwide who call themselves ‘Anabaptist’, and we have to decide what we do and don’t have in common. In the process, however, we should be wary of our increasing tendencies to identify ourselves solely with MC-USA and the North American Mennonite Church. Our continuing division of the church along national boundaries worries me.
And as someone wrote today in a response to Tim and me on YAR: “We [all] draw from a story, beginning in the Bible, of God welcoming the unwelcomeable and seeking reconciliation between people. Conversation and discernment in a spirit of community with those who disagree with us seems to me to be much more in keeping with that story than does cutting ourselves off from others to protect principles. And unity is more poignant when it is something that is clung to despite differences that make us want to go our separate ways.”
June 2nd, 2007 at 2:55 am
Jonny, I appreciate the emphasis you’ve placed on a continuous community of discernment - this messy space where we converse amidst our diversity and clashing perspectives, attempting to unearth our commonalities, perhaps finding transformation through disagreement - albeit difficult, not “cutting ourselves off” from this story and spirit.
I’m curious to know what this looks like practically to you - where and how do such spaces grow? Are they happening already? Does an institution such as Mennonite World Conference create such a space?
June 4th, 2007 at 5:57 am
Nicole: Good questions. I was hoping nobody would ask that. My easy answer is that those spaces grow out of BikeMovement. In a more limited sense, they grow out of this website and they grow out of the Young Anabaptist Radicals website. Ideally, they grow out of Mennonite World Conference, and they grow out of AMIGOS. They grow out of MMN and MCC (and EMM?) workers who travel and visit churches. When I visited the MWC offices in Strasbourg a few weeks ago and spoke to MWC General Secretary Larry Miller, I was heartened. I would confidently say that he has a good vision of MWC and the global Mennonite Church, and I’m hopeful that MWC is creating these “spaces” we’re talking about.
That’s the easy answer. Do all of these institutions always do good work? No. Are we doing enough to create these spaces? No. But I’m arguing that they are being created and should continue to be created, and you all are doing good work. We shouldn’t give up just because the dialogue is messy (as you say) and we don’t know how to do it best. That will never change.
Honestly, I’ve been a skeptical supporter of BikeMovement. In the U.S. last year, I thought, “Hey, that’s cool. I wish I could do that, because I care about the Church too. But it’s cool that they’re doing that.” Then in Asia this year, I thought, “Hmmm, weird. Sounds like they want a vacation, and they want the church to pay for part of it. Good excuse, I suppose. Who are they going to talk to? They don’t even speak the language.” I identified closely with Tim’s concerns: I was highly critical of the value of cross-cultural theological dialogue, and pretending that we have lots in common when we really don’t.
But now I’ve changed my mind, partly due to a 3-week course in Europe on Anabaptist/Mennonite history (as Krista mentioned earlier). I’m pumped about BikeMovementAsia, and I think it’s one of the best ways to create space for important dialogue with global Anabaptists/Mennonites. What better way than for a group of young Mennonites to travel around and speak to other Anabaptists? I only wish I could be there, or could read more detailed summaries of your discussions.
But maybe I’ll think about this more… Thoughts from others? What are other ways to build an increasing global awareness among North American Mennonites?
November 13th, 2008 at 3:03 am
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