Canadian Mennonite
Volume 8, No. 24
December 20, 2004

Faith&Life

Worthy of God's call:

A mediation by Menno Simons

For his October 31 sermon at Foothills Mennonite Church in Calgary, Doug Klassen took on the persona of Menno Simons, based on his writings and other sources. Following is Menno’s meditation entitled, “That God may make us worthy of his call” (2 Thessalonians 1).

I thought the matter was closed. I thought that by publishing the booklet, A Clear Account of Excommunication, the issue would be laid to rest.

This sculpture of Menno Simons was created by Esther K. Augsburger in 1987. Fashioned from bonded copper, it is about 12 inches high. A photograph of the sculpture appears in the book, Menno Simons: Places, Portraits and Progeny, by Piet Visser and Mary Sprunger (Friesens, 1996).
Some had been imposing doctrines to a greater degree than they should have, especially in the case of excommunication. In some cases, everyone was banning everyone else from the church—sometimes over minor differences. And so in 1550, I sat down and wrote, hoping to close the matter.

“Fellow believers, brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,” I wrote. “I discover that for some time now much strife has been occasioned among some by the ban, and that so vehemently and recklessly so, that brotherly love, I fear, is among many destroyed rather than advanced, and Christian peace and unity is decreased rather than increased.”

From there I went on to plead with those who were practising the ban in far too many instances. Unfortunately, my booklet, printed in secret, did not lay the matter to rest. The controversy grew until in 1555 some of the brethren proposed that the ban could be imposed without the three warnings given in Matthew 18. I was against this.

I was also against being more strict in enforcing avoidance of excommunicated members, particularly when family members were involved.

I received letter after letter begging me to take sides. I was in hiding, but I would need to intervene. As I prepared for the trip I wondered: How could we have become so entangled in the application of our doctrine? Wasn’t ours a movement that was to liberate? What would my parents think?
Early life

I was born in 1496 to a Dutch family in the village of Witmarsum in the province of Friesland. Early in my life my parents decided to consecrate me to the service of the church, and entrusted me to the care of a monastery near our home.

For years I devoted myself to the spiritual exercises and theological studies required of a Roman Catholic priest. I learned Latin and Greek, and became acquainted with the writings of the early church fathers. As for the Bible, I never opened its pages.

At the age of 28, I was ordained to the priesthood. My first charge was the parish at Pingjum, next to my home village, where I was second in the rank of three priests. I had achieved the dream of my family. I was now able to live in a class much higher than my humble origins. It was an easy, carefree life, for those of us in the service of Rome were well-treated.

But outward appearances did not tell the full story of my life during the next 12 years. I began to have doubts, not from my own ministry, but because of what I was hearing. During a visit to my brothers at the monastery, I came across the writings of Martin Luther, which they weren’t supposed to have. What I read was to change me forever.

One day, when I was handling the bread and the wine during the mass, the thought flashed through my mind that this bit of bread could not possibly be the actual flesh of Christ as I had been taught. At first I reasoned that it was the devil trying to lure me away from my faith. I prayed and confessed, but the conviction grew.

In a search for help, I opened the New Testament. What I read there convinced me that the bread was not the actual body of Christ, but a symbol taken in remembrance of him. I was relieved and yet troubled—I was doubting one of the church’s cardinal doctrines.

Not long after this, I heard that a tailor in Leeuwarden had been beheaded because of re-baptism. Why would someone seek a re-baptism? Again I searched the Scriptures. And I consulted the writings of Luther, Ulrich Zwingli and Heinrich Bullinger. I asked my superior in Pingjum if there was a scriptural foundation for infant baptism. No one could give me a satisfying answer.

Meanwhile, I kept on with my duties. In fact, I was promoted to a more lucrative position at Witmarsum.

Anabaptists appear
About this time Anabaptists of various types began to appear in the vicinity, including disciples of Jan Matthys, a popular preacher who was spreading radical thoughts. I vigorously attacked him, but the more I preached against Anabaptism, the more I was drawn to it.

I could not embrace what Matthys was promoting—he seemed to be more concerned with overthrowing the ruling class than with Christian doctrine. When Matthys heard that peasants had overthrown the rulers in Muenster, Germany, he decided to make this city his base for forceably establishing the kingdom of God on earth. By 1534, he had control of the city.

That same year, some of his disciples came to Witmarsum and established a sect there that included my own brother, Peter. I preached against the Muensterites and tried to win back those who had been deceived.

And then the authorities reached the end of their tolerance. They closed in on the radicals in Witmarsum who had taken refuge in an old cloister and attacked them. My brother Peter died by the sword. Not long after, a slaughter took place in Muenster as well.

When I heard of this violence and destruction, I knew I could not adopt their doctrine. But I knew that I had to adopt their courage.

So in January of 1536, I resigned my priestly office, renounced the Catholic church, and shut the door on my career, my salary, and my life of ease. I chose instead a life of uncertainty, poverty and persecution. But I found a life of true service, and I had peace with God.

I spent my next years serving the very people I had criticized. I accepted a re-baptism from Obbe Philips who led a peaceful Anabaptist movement. I married and soon had three children. Because of my training and knowledge, I quickly became recognized as a leader, though I had great doubts in my own abilities.

The next years I moved my family from place to place in search of safety. On more than one occasion, those who hosted us paid for their hospitality with their lives. Together with Obbe and Dirk Philips, I began to preach, baptize, write, and ordain leaders in our growing church. In 1542, an imperial edict forbade anyone to associate with us. A reward was put on my head.

My faith was nearly shattered when Obbe Philips defected from the Anabaptist cause. We can only assume that living under constant threat took its toll. His brother Dirk and I carried on, though the righteous everywhere were being crushed with fire and sword.

Many of us moved to East Friesland because it was giving asylum to so-called heretics. There I consented to engage in debates with other religious leaders under the condition that they would not be publicized. But time after time our words were published for all to read.

I fled with my family to the free city of Wismar on the Baltic Sea, already under Lutheran governance. Here we had a debate that lasted 10 days, with neither side moving from its position. Because of the publicity, we were all driven from the city. But even on the move, I kept writing, teaching and defending our group from our enemies.


Bannings begin
As tolerance began to grow across Europe, however, tolerance became scarce inside our precious church. First an elder, Adam Pastor, renounced the Trinity, the pre-existence of Christ, and the Holy Spirit. And then Frans de Cyper rejected
several doctrines and signalled a return to Catholicism. We banned them both.

Next Antonius Van Koeln, a survivor of Muenster, left the movement. Gillis von Aachen, a man who had baptized more martyrs than any of us, had a moral lapse and I had no choice but to place him under the ban. It seemed that every co-labourer I had was departing from me.

Because of the price on my head, I could not return to Friesland. Leonard Bouwens and Dirk Philips ministered there, but their doctrine became more rigid than it should have. When I heard that Bouwens threatened to impose the ban on a married woman because she refused to shun her husband, I could stay silent no longer.

On November 12, 1556 I wrote a letter vigorously protesting these harsh practices. I travelled to Friesland in the hope of promoting unity. But I was not prepared for what was to come.

In my booklet, A Clear Account of Excommunication, I had outlined my understanding of discipline according to Matthew 18. But Bouwens cited 1 Corinthians 5:11 as saying that the faithful “should not eat” with the unfaithful. He pushed it so far as to say that converted family members should end their relationship with their Catholic family members.

I couldn’t believe they would take it this far. But after three days of debate, I wavered. I could see that unless I agreed, they would impose the ban on me, so I half-heartedly consented to their position.

I returned home, grieving over the sad state of affairs in the church that I loved. We had become a people of God’s peace in relation to our enemies, but inside the church we mistreated each other in the name of the gospel.

I continued to travel extensively in the interests of harmony, but to no avail. We were expelled from Wismar, but by the grace of God we found refuge with a nobleman in Wuestenfeld (waste-field). He invited us because of our ability to till this poor land, but he became our shield from the authorities. I was even allowed to set up a printing press.

Now in my sixth decade, I give thanks for the grace of God in my life, but I have regrets. I regret the strict interpretation of the ban. I regret that I was not able to save my brother from a violent death. I regret that I did not convert more to the Anabaptist way.

Yet I thank God that I was made worthy of his call. I thank God that he showed me that we are to love, and not kill, our enemies; that true evangelical faith cannot lie dormant—it must clothe the naked and feed the hungry; that new birth consists not in water nor words, but the quickening power of God in our hearts.

“No other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” Beloved, do not depart from the doctrine and the life of Christ.—Doug Klassen








Waiting in the darkness

People of faith go through this annual cycle of waiting, remembering and anticipation. With child-like anticipation, we hear the story unfold. We anticipate God’s blessing, just as ancient Israel did, though we know that there will be blood and pain woven into the mix.

Having lit our Advent candles, we wait for the birth: darkness pregnant with hope, a Word waiting to be spoken.

This year I have been sheltered from the busyness and commercialism of North American Christmas. In my little house in Burkina Faso, it is dark and quiet with an extraordinary aura of peace—no lights, no decorations, no music, no snow. I am not with the angel choirs; I am not with Santa in the malls; I am not even with Handel’s Messiah. I am left with the written word, the Incarnate Word, and (like Mary) the ponderings of my heart.

But I have not been sheltered from others’ suffering. Burkina Faso is a terribly poor country. In villages I see babies with big malnourished bellies and glazed-over eyes, their mothers with the same glaze of hopelessness. When we finish a meal of fish and rice at a roadside stand, three street children descend on the remaining bones and strip them clean. This is in contrast to the copious wealth gained by violence and corruption one is exposed to in the cities.

And so, as I prepare my heart this year, I skip the birth story and go directly to the murdered babies—Rachel and the mothers in Bethlehem who had to sacrifice their sons. The bloody afterbirth.

Author Annie Dillard scorns the way we try to make the Christmas story into “a pretty and sensible picture, like something on a Christmas card.” There is nothing pretty about having your first baby in a barn, or fleeing terrified into the night to start your life as a refugee, or hearing the screams of mothers who have had their baby sons ripped out of their arms.

It is as if our doorways in North America have become marked with a big ‘S’ for Santa, and the angel of the whole truth passes us by.

The truth is that Emmanuel, who came to ransom captive Israel, must first be given asylum from Israel. The Word incarnate came as a refugee into this world he spoke into being. And in a lovely redemptive reversal, it is Egypt—the country from which the Israelites fled as slaves—that provides a safe haven for the Holy Family.

In West Africa this Christmas, I find the Word incarnate in the eyes of urban refugee children. Their families can be found in obscure corners all over Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso’s capital city, having fled from terrors in Congo, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Central African Republic and, more recently, Darfur, Sudan. As I visit one home I see three children lying on a plastic mat on the cold concrete floor—not so different from a feed bin in a barn.

Even in the face of this daily suffering, I see such strength of spirit. I see warmth and generosity. I see smiles that shine like the rays of a star. I see Jesus. My African friends teach me about waiting. The birth we celebrate at Advent is much closer to their families than to mine.

“What came into existence was life, and the life was the light to live by. The Life-light blazed out of the darkness; the darkness could not put it out” (John 1:4,5, The Message).—Laurel Borisenko

The writer is a member of Lendrum Mennonite Brethren Church in Edmonton. She is part of the MCC West Africa leadership team.

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