As some readers know, just this past week I enjoyed my one Warholian fifteen-minutes-of-fame: one of my posts made it to WordPress’s home page, sort of my version of being “on the cover of the Rolling Stone,” if you know what I mean. It was in that Warholian post, Conical Combat Linkages, that I revealed that I’m a “Mennonite by choice.” According to my stats, more than a few people now know this about me.
Interestingly, also last week Anna Groff, an editor of one of our Church’s national periodicals, The Mennonite, contacted me about an article she’s putting together on Mennonites who work at the VA. Apparently there is not a huge crew of us, surprise, surprise.
For readers who may not know: Mennonites are a Protestant group who were originally known as “Anabaptists” during the Reformation. Originally from Switzerland, southern Germany, and Holland, many came over to the United States in the eighteenth century, first living in the Pennsylvania area, then moving to the Midwest, especially Indiana and Ohio, with later groups settling in Kansas and points West, or in the western regions of Canada. There also is a large group who live in Central America and in Paraguay.
Don’t ask about the latter two. It’s complicated.
(I did feel compelled to mention the latter, however, given that a group of one of our more distant, conservative cousins, the Beachy Amish Mennonites, living in Nicaragua, were described in a not-too-flattering front page article in the New York Times today. For those who have read the piece, just rest assured: when I say distant, I mean distant. I’ll leave it at that.)
Traditionally Mennonites, like the Quakers, have felt strongly that the Christian faith requires its adherents to avoid violence, seek peace, and refrain from participating in wars. In other words, we are usually referred to as pacifists.
Ergo the title of this post.
Anna sent me a list of thought-provoking questions to answer for her article, and so I decided: well, since I’ve identified myself as Mennonite on the blog, I might as well answer her questions in a post. After all, readers–and even more, patients–should know whom they are getting when they get me so that, well, they can decide whether they even want to get me at all.
Because this is such a complex issue that speaks so directly to many areas of my life about which I feel strongly and deeply, my essay in answer to her questions is quite long, even for me! Also, it has a certain in-group-ness about it which may not be agreeable to many readers. Moreover, for many readers a discussion of issues of faith itself might not be the way you’re wanting to while away your next more-than-several minutes of your life.
Given that, I have posted the essay separately, under the title Letter to a Mennonite Pastor, which can be accessed either through the link just provided or through the “Thoughts” menu above. It may end up of interest only to fellow Mennonites. (It may end up of interest to absolutely no one at all.) Still, as I deal in it directly with my role as someone who is both a member of a particular faith community and as someone who serves combat veterans, I hope that others might find that the discussion in it will, at least in some way, prove enlightening.
Many thanks to all those who have visited the blog these past few days, and especially many thanks to those of you who “liked” the Conical Combat Veteran post and to those of you who have subscribed. I hope that I continue to write posts that each of you will find worthy of the respect and caring every returning combat veteran deserves.
