![\"Prakash](\"https:\/\/mwc-cmm.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/prakash_thankachan_project_officer_justice_peace_sector_of_mcc_india2_nkraybill.jpg\")
\u201cMany people around the world do reconciliation,\u201d said Prakash Thankachan<\/strong> of India, \u201cbut Christians have a different motivation. Jesus said, \u2018my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives\u2019 (John 14:27).\u201d<\/p>\nAn ordained deacon in the Church of North India, Prakash works with Mennonite Central Committee to train others in peacebuilding skills. He cites the 1569 Dirk Willems prison break story from the Netherlands and 2006 Amish school shooting forgiveness as examples of Anabaptist peace witness that particularly inspire him.<\/p>\n
Marcus Weiand<\/strong>, of the Free Evangelical church, director of the Institute for Conflict Transformation at Bienenberg, Switzerland, points to Jesus. \u201cWhat I learned from Anabaptism is strong emphasis on God coming down to humanity in Jesus Christ to care for the hungry and needy. We are called to follow Jesus now so closely that we get dusty from his feet.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNonviolence is the gift of Anabaptists,\u201d Torres says. \u201cAnabaptists work at peacemaking out of a strong sense of community.\u201d<\/p>\n To break a cycle of retribution, MK church members provide vocational training so prison inmates can function productively when released. \u201cIf you kill someone in Ethiopia,\u201d he explains, \u201ceven if you serve a long prison term, you will die from revenge killing as soon as you are released.\u201d The church works to prepare prisoners\u2019 home communities to receive them.<\/p>\n Church members are quick to tell others they do this work because Christ came to reconcile us. \u201cSome 1,200 persons commit their lives to Christ each year through this ministry,\u201d Tewodros says.<\/p>\n \u201cThe church\u2019s peace work should have a vision of mission. We have a gospel <\/em>of peace and need to be evangelists who call others to peaceful relationship with God.\u201d<\/p>\n Grace Carhart<\/strong>, graduate student at the Institute for Christian Studies, Toronto, Canada, sees the church\u2019s potential \u201cto allow ourselves to be shaped in positive ways by community. With a solid base of positive identity, people of the church don\u2019t have to be afraid to interact with those who are different.\u201d<\/p>\n Not Mennonite herself, Grace Carhart sees Mennonites as being open to diverse groups and perspectives. Hector Acero Ferrer<\/strong> of Colombia, who jointly led a workshop with her, said, \u201cThe church is a place where people again and again can tell the story of being a victim \u2013 or a perpetrator.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014J. Nelson Kraybill is president of MWC (2015\u20132021). He lives in Indiana, USA. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Is Christian peacemaking different from other forms of reconciliation? Do Anabaptists work at peacebuilding in ways that set them apart? Several of 223 persons from 36 countries at the 2nd Global Mennonite Peacebuilding Conference in the Netherlands (27\u201329 June 2019) responded to those questions. \u201cMany people around the world do reconciliation,\u201d said Prakash Thankachan of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10926,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"network":[148],"eventcategory":[],"class_list":["post-6842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","network-global-anabaptist-peace-network"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n![\"Katherine](\"https:\/\/mwc-cmm.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/img_2094_katherine_torres_of_colombia_nkraybill_photosmall.jpg\")
Civil war is the context of incarnational peacebuilding by Anabaptists in Colombia. Mennonite attorney Katherine Torres<\/strong>, coordinator of Puentes para la Paz (Bridges for Peace), spoke of her efforts to draw Christians from many denominations into the peace process near the end of Colombia\u2019s 60 years of civil war. They initiated risky dialogue with the militia groups. \u201cAt one point we were in the middle of a fire fight,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n![\"Tewodros](\"https:\/\/mwc-cmm.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/img_2155_towodros_beyene_nkraybill_photosmall.jpg\")
Ethiopia is an example of Anabaptist peace witness grounded in community. \u201cChrist himself is our peace (Ephesians 2),\u201d says Tewodros Beyene<\/strong>, president of Meserete Kristos (MK) church, an Anabaptist denomination. \u201cIt\u2019s because of Christ that we come together as a church.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"Grace](\"https:\/\/mwc-cmm.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/grace_carhart_hector_a._acero_ferrer_n_kraybill_2.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Derek](\"https:\/\/mwc-cmm.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/img_2117_derek_suderman_nkraybill_photo.jpg\")
For Anabaptists to sustain the hard work of peacebuilding, Derek Suderman<\/strong> of Conrad Grebel University College in Canada underscores that we must keep our primary language <\/em>of biblical\/theological understanding central. Out of that base emerges our secondary language <\/em>of human rights and international law. \u201cThe survival of the Mennonite peace position depends upon our ability to articulate the primary reasons we do peacemaking,\u201d he asserts. \u201cPeacemaking should be byproduct of our faith, not the thing itself.\u201d<\/p>\n