News
Reconfiguring the Conference structure
Early on in my social work career, I was introduced to the notion of self-care and rest. Growing up as I did on a dairy farm, I was mostly indifferent to its meaning. Getting up early to do farm chores—whether I was tired or not—was not optional. We (my dad, my brothers and I) just…
Finding the Sabbath in sabbatical
For many years I’ve been blessed to serve in congregations that give priority to offering sabbaticals to its pastors. Yes, Mennonite Church USA congregations get a not-so-subtle nudge from the denomination. A recommended sabbatical policy is written into pastoral support guidelines. Congregations may choose whether to follow the guidelines, and not all do. Even in…
Register for “Joy in the Journey,” the 2018 VMC Ministry Retreat
Credentialed leaders and their spouses are invited to a weekend VMC Ministry Retreat. There will be activities and input from Bob Briscoe, WCRC Director.
Conference terminates Yoder’s credentials
Based on the findings of the Virginia Mennonite Conference (VMC) Investigation Team regarding Duane Yoder, the previous pastor of Lindale Mennonite Church, Linville, Va., and on Yoder’s decision not to contest those findings by declining to participate further in this process, Conference leadership acted to terminate Duane Yoder’s ministerial credentials for further ministry within Virginia…
Finding the image of God in each incarcerated neighbor
I will not forget my first time in the Harrisonburg/Rockingham Regional Jail. I was leading music for a Sunday service with Minister Mark Lehman. We were let into the building through a system of locked doors, each controlled by some unseen force behind the surveillance cameras. Arriving in the room where the service would take…
Where does the Virginia Mennonite story begin?
Perhaps the Virginia Mennonite Conference story begins in early summer 1671, in a village in the German Palatinate, where deacon Valentine Heatwole offers bedding and clothing to Christina Weis, a thirty-six-year-old refugee who had fled her home in Switzerland, traveling more than two hundred miles with her three children, the youngest only twelve months of…
FaithTrust Institute trains Investigation Team, others in VMC
Every Virginia Mennonite Conference pastoral leader agrees to honor certain boundaries as part of receiving ministerial credentials. Knowledge of what are appropriate behaviors and what are not is crucial to a pastor’s effective ministry. To increase awareness of the need for healthy and appropriate boundaries, and to provide ongoing education, VMC invited a consulting group…
Conference Council approves Gordon Zook as interim Conference Minister during Kratz’s sabbatical
News release September 27, 2017 The September meeting of Conference Council, Virginia Mennonite Conference’s governing body, launched a temporary time of transition. Effective October 1, Executive Conference Minister Clyde G. Kratz begins a three-month sabbatical. Conference Council hired Gordon Zook, former Oversight Leader for VMC’s Leadership/Administration Cluster, to serve as a part-time interim Conference Minister….
Across boundaries and divisions, being “Neighbors: Strangers No More”
I bind my soul this day to the neighbor far away, to the stranger near at hand in this town and in this land. (Verse 2 of I Bind My Heart This Tide) In a landscape of walls and fences, of separation and alienation because others may look, sound, and act different from us, delegates…
News release: VMC actions since DSA report
Virginia Mennonite Conference (VMC) is actively pursuing the recommendations that were presented to us by Mennonite Church USA (MC USA) based on the D. Stafford & Associates report (DSA). The DSA report, received January 2017, contains the findings from the investigation associated with VMC leadership responses to the knowledge of Luke Hartman’s inappropriate activities. The…