One day can change a life. A one-day learning trip to the U.S.-Mexico border in 2013 made a big impact on the lives of youth
It was an emotional moment, said IBA director Rafael Barahona, because receiving a certificate from IBA is the first accomplishment of this kind for many. A large portion are first-generation immigrants.
Simon Schrock, executive director of the largest distributor of Choice Books, located in Manassas, Va., said each letter that comes into his office is saved, and staff try to respond to all of them. There are 27 boxes full.
2014 started with a mild winter and early spring. Precipitation that would have fallen during a typical winter came all at once in May, bringing three months’ worth of rain in just three days.
Zook, an Amish man from New Holland, Pa., likely never expected to hear a language spoken predominately in Amish communities so far from home — and from a black man. Brown, an African-American Mennonite from Hesston, quickly revealed that the two men share religious historical Anabaptist ties. Though the simple greeting exhausted Brown’s Pennsylvania Dutch, it led to a friendship and sharing of worlds — that of the Amish, Mennonite and African-American cultures.
The violence hit home for the small Mennonite Brethren congregation a couple of years ago when a neighborhood house was hit by gunfire in a gang altercation. The home belonged to the parents of a young woman in the church family and shook up the congregation.
