In 2011, the local mission work of Zion Lutheran
Church and Akron Mennonite Church around two symptoms of poverty, affordable
housing and food insecurity/hunger, drew them together at the Mennonite
church’s annual Mission Fest weekend.
Typically, the weekend highlighted the global mission work of the
Mennonite congregation and its deep relationship with Mennonite Central
Committee, headquartered in Akron. But
the growth in local mission through the proclamation of a “local theology
rooted in Scripture and community life” encouraged the Mennonite congregation’s
leaders to consider a local focus for the mission fest weekend.
The steering committee chose food, faith, and hunger
for the 2011 festival theme. The weekend
included a community dinner made with fresh, local ingredients; and a keynote
speaker, Craig Goodwin, a Presbyterian Pastor from Spokane, WA who wrote a book
titled, Year of Plenty about his
family’s journey to live more sustainably and locally. The dinner also celebrated the 40th
anniversary of Ephrata Area Social Services (EASS). EASS
was founded by the former Pastor of Holy Trinity Lutheran, Ephrata to broaden
the social ministry capacity of the Ephrata area churches, to pool resources,
and to identify long-term solutions to the symptoms and causes of poverty.
EASS continues to play a vital role in this
community’s efforts to reduce the effects of poverty in the lives of its
residents—especially children, the elderly, and the disabled. They serve over 3,000 meals a month through
meals-on-wheels and serve over 8,000 people annually at their food bank.
Pastor Matt Lenahan of Zion Lutheran Church, Akron
was invited to share practical ideas that might connect congregations to
anti-hunger work and food relief. Since
2008, Zion, an ELCA congregation, has offered Peter’s Porch, a monthly ministry
of hospitality that includes a free hot breakfast, clothing, personal hygiene
items, and emergency food supplies. They serve over 160 families every month.
Pastor Lenahan is also the chair of the Lancaster
Hunger Coalition, a broader community-wide effort to examine the threat of food
insecurity in Lancaster and to implement an intentional plan to reduce the
threat and increase the health of Lancaster county residents. Nutrition and
access are the two primary targets of the coalition’s strategy to become a
hunger-free community.
One goal of the coalition is to encourage local food
growers and local hunger relief sites to work together to increase the amount
of nutritious, local food in the food relief system. Building a coalition is challenging work in a
decentralized, competitive food system.
The hope is that cooperation driven by a common interest, to end hunger,
will bring people together in creative and exciting ways. Churches, businesses, schools, and the health
care community are coming together in unprecedented ways to address food
insecurity in Lancaster.
As a sign of their growing partnership in mission, the
Akron Mennonite Church invited Pastor Lenahan and Zion to participate in the
planning for the 2012 mission fest. Once
again, local mission drove the event.
Food, faith, and hunger remained the theme. Joe Arthur, the Executive Director of the
Central PA Food Bank (a regional food bank in the Feeding America Network
servicing Lancaster and 26 other counties in central PA) was invited as the
keynote speaker at the dinner. He is a
Lancaster County resident and serves on the local hunger coalition.
The two congregations decided to hold
a joint worship service on mission fest Sunday, highlighting the spirit of
cooperation and mutual edification emerging between them. Pastor Lenahan was
invited to share the story of Peter’s Porch at the dinner and to preach in worship at the Mennonite Church on Sunday morning. Jim S. Amstutz, Lead Pastor of Akron
Mennonite served as worship leader. Jim
serves on the Leadership Council of the Lancaster County Coalition to End
Homelessness and chairs Homes of Hope-Ephrata, a faith-based transitional
housing ministry.
When the topic of Holy Communion came up, the
Pastors recognized unfortunate barriers that still exist between them. Pastor Lenahan dialogued with his Bishop, B.
Penrose Hoover (Lower Susquehanna Synod), about worshiping together. Given
the emerging ecumenical relationship between the two churches, it was
acknowledged that we do not currently share altar and pulpit fellowship with
the Anabaptists. In recent years,
however, considerable healing in the relationship between the two church bodies
has occurred.
Most notably, the service of forgiveness and
reconciliation conducted in Stuttgart, Germany in July of 2010. The Lutheran World Federation issued a formal
action seeking forgiveness for Lutheran persecution of Anabaptists during the
16th century, persecutions that were supported by theological
argument and violent attacks. In April
of 2012, ELCA and Mennonite Church, USA representatives marked reconciliation
and emerging unity in a service of dedication at a tree-planting in Elkhart,
Ind.
At the service, André Gingerich Stoner, director of
holistic witness and interchurch relations for Mennonite Church USA, noted:
…the
one root system symbolizes the roots we share in God’s love and grace. The
three trunks remind us that “as we
grow in relationship we maintain our own identity even as Christ is always
present with us as a third
partner. This tree dedication mirrors tree plantings that have occurred in
other locations worldwide that also
signify the deepening relationships between Mennonites and Lutherans -
www.mennonitechurchusa.org.
Nevertheless, coming together for worship could not
include the sharing of the Lord’s Supper.
So a service of the Word was planned with a combined choir. A simple meal of soup and bread was offered
by Akron Mennonite as a powerful symbol of shared table fellowship.
Pastor Lenahan’s sermon included these remarks:
For Lutherans, the
Lord’s supper is the place where God feeds us and sends us to feed others. Lutherans feed the world. ELCA World Hunger is $19 million in over 30
countries bringing relief from hunger, education and development toward
sustainable agriculture so that people can provide the food they need. Some of
us feed our neighbors, in community meals, food drives, Peter’s Porch. We do so because we believe God has fed us,
there is an abundance of food, we care called to “give them something to eat”—Mark
6:37. We believe Christ has sent us to give daily bread to our neighbors, until
there is no more hunger on the earth…Brothers and sisters in Christ, we are not
celebrating the Lord’s Supper here today.
I hope that in the future we can and we do. The table of grace has become a
line-in-the-sand for denominational brokenness.
That we cannot eat and drink around the common Eucharistic table must not
deter us, however, from joining together in fellowship meals and in community
meals and in feeding the hungry poor in our neighborhoods. May we come to know
the risen Jesus in the bread we share.
May we strive to end hunger together as God’s holy servants, fed,
forgiven, and sent to offer ourselves to others in the name of Jesus the bread
of life. Amen.
The two congregations are exploring next steps in
their relationship as a people called to embody the love of Christ together in
both word and deed.
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