Xtina's Crossing: Pan y Paz, Truth and Reconciliation

Some of the pan at church

Last weekend a lot was going on in my world. Here in Colombia the Mennonite Churches were celebrating Pan y Paz, Bread and Peace. In the MWC world, it was Peace Sunday. And In BC it was the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) event in Vancouver. Three different events, for most people completely separate, but for me they share many links.

Let me start with the TRC. If you haven’t heard about the TRC in Canada, here’s an introduction. I’d heard about this event coming to BC years ago. MCBC, my provincial church, has been preparing for it for quite some time, and I know numerous people who participated. I really wanted to participate, but plans changed and being in Bogotá does not lend itself to participating in Vancouver events.

I found a live stream online, and I thought I could watch some of it while working, but that was not a good plan. The small part I watched was so impactful, hearing people share of such deep and profound pain, I couldn’t listen to it while being in that setting. I’m glad the public record of everything that was shared is available online, so that I and anyone else who wasn’t able to be there can still see it.

Truth and Reconciliation. Hearing the painful truth of what has happened, so that we can work for reconciliation. Building relationships that acknowledge the hurt that has gone before, yet still have hope for the future.

This was going on in BC, and it was heavy on my mind, my heart and in my prayers here in Colombia. I’ve heard several people hear express that perhaps something similar to the TRC could help work for healing in the conflicts that have and continue to go on in Colombia. I still have much to learn about the complex context of Colombia, but it is clear that truth and reconciliation are needed in many ways.

Yet I am continually amazed at the Anabaptist churches, that I have come to know here, and the way they live out their faith in the Lord by sharing a holistic gospel. A gospel, a good news, that has its foundation in Christ alone, but doesn’t stay as only head knowledge, as only something felt personally. No, it is expressed by the hands and feet of the church, the people who are the church.

In the past year the MWC Peace Commission created a poster that says “Peace is gospel.” Peace is good news. I believe that peace is central, foundational, and integral to the gospel message of Jesus Christ, not an added-on theology that you can take or leave, but inseparable from who Jesus is.

Heading to the concert.

And I’ve seen that lived out here in the Anabaptist churches, and got to experience it again with Pan y Paz. On Saturday, September 21, I spent the morning with two other MCCers in Soacha, the municipality just South of Bogotá. There we joined a Mennonite program called Creciendo Juntos (Growing Together) and their Pan y Paz celebrations. Creciendo Juntos is one of several Anabaptist programs and churches in Soacha. It is in a marginalized neighbourhood, with houses built on unstable hillsides because there is nowhere else to go, and displacement being the main cause most live there.

Creciendo Juntos works with the children of this community, and there are a lot. We saw many smiling faces. To celebrate Pan y Paz there were workshops, games, picking up garbage together, lunch, and a concert of local teens presenting their own rap songs. The reality these kids face every day is unlike any I have ever experienced. The stories and realities the staff of Creciendo Juntos encounter is challenging to say the least. Yet their smiles and joy show the presence of hope.

Group activity in Soacha

Getting ready for the concert.

The paper cranes for each person

Hope was also brought home to me in the worship service on Sunday morning at the Berna Mennonite Church. The sanctuary was filled with paper cranes, symbols of peace. In the middle of the sanctuary stood two tables, one filled with a paper crane for each person, and the other filled with bread we had brought with us.

Pan y Paz. Bread and Peace. Jesus is the source of our peace, and to have peace among each other, everyone needs to have enough to live, everyone needs bread. This is justice; that everyone has enough.

Worship Service at Berna

In the worship service we shared this bread with each other, making sure that everyone received bread. And after the service was done, in small groups people took the rest of bread out to the community around the church, and shared it with whoever they met.

Pan y Paz. Bread and Peace. Truth and Reconciliation. These were very different events, occurring in completely different parts of the world, in different languages. Yet to me the threads that tie them together are strong.

I see people coming together, listening and sharing from the heart, from the core of who they are. I see people living out the call to peace that is the gospel. Not just knowing and believing it, but living and walking with others. Humbling themselves to listen and walk the path of reconciliation and healing. Humbling themselves to share from what they have until we all have enough.

Problems and pain still abound, but there is hope. Our God is a great God. I am continually filled with awe at the ways the Holy Spirit is at work in the church and that gives me hope for pan y paz and truth and reconciliation.