Taking in refugees from Syria wasn’t the initial plan of Forest Hills Mennonite Church in Leola, Pa. “In February, our winter Bible school focused on immigration,” lead pastor Jon Carlson said. “This was long before the Syrian refugee crisis made headlines. Syria wasn’t on our radar.”
WINNIPEG, Man. — Canadian Mennonite University made headlines this fall when it was revealed that workers at the CMU Farm, in collaboration with members of the Métis community, had successfully grown an ancient variety of squash from seeds shared with them by the White Earth Seed Library in Minnesota.
Thanksgiving’s roots in an encounter between European settlers and indigenous people point to a dark side of that history. Mennonites who want to raise awareness of unjust treatment of indigenous people are using a little-known historical precedent — the Doctrine of Discovery — to show how indigenous people are still being negatively affected today.
