Creation Care
3 When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
4 what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?
-Psalm 8:3-4 NIV
energy saint
HPMF member Roger Piper-Ruth wrote the words and music to “Energy Saint” - all about the different ways an individual can work to preserve and care for God’s creation. The photos in the video are of specific ways that HPMF members are working for creation care.
The video was featured by The Mennonite and The Mennonite Creation Care Network.
Video by: Lauresta and Justin Welty
Repair Network
Paula Bachman, Pam Piper-Ruth, and Roger Piper-Ruth
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We are part of a network of church communities engaged in education, solidarity and reparative action alongside Indigenous Peoples.
We are committed to learning more about local indigenous history and to lamenting the impacts on our region and beyond.
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We are committed to putting restitution / repair funds in our church budget each year.
We are committed to showing up for justice alongside Indigenous communities locally or internationally as we listen and learn from them.
We are committed to engaging in Earth care in order to restore lands damaged in part by the history of the Doctrine of Discovery.
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“Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?…
If you remove the yoke from among you…
Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
the restorer of streets to live in.”
— Isaiah 58:6,9b,12
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Land acknowledgement is one way to resist erasure of Indigenous history as well as honor tribes and the land they stewarded for thousands of years. We are living on traditional land of the Shoshone, Bannock and Northern Paiute nations, who did not see land as a commodity but as a living partner that needed to be loved and cared for properly. We offer gratitude for the tribes’ continued presence here despite colonization. May we as white settlers learn and grow in our understanding of what it means to be responsible caretakers of the land and how we can make reparations to our neighbors.
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Suggested books, articles, videos, podcasts, and websites.
Mennonite World Conference Declaration of Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples
Braver Angels Activities
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We state our views freely and fully, without fear.
We treat people who disagree with us with honesty, dignity and respect.
We welcome opportunities to engage those with whom we disagree.
We believe all of us have blind spots and none of us are not worth talking to.
We seek to disagree accurately, avoiding exaggeration and stereotypes.
We look for common ground where it exists and, if possible, find ways to work together.
We believe that, in disagreements, both sides share and learn.
In Braver Angels, neither side is teaching the other or giving feedback on how to think or say things differently.
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In 2018 Hyde Park Mennonite Fellowship Marc Schlegel-Preheim and Jessica Ice, the pastor at that time and intern, respectively, saw the political animosity and division in our community, state, and nation. As leaders in an historic peace church, they felt called to find ways to be peacemakers amid the political and cultural conflicts. They discovered Braver Angels.
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Braver Angels is a national, volunteer-based, secular organization working to reduce the political division in the USA. They do this by teaching skills to speak to those with whom we disagree and providing opportunities to talk about important issues in safe and respectable settings.
The work of Braver Angels converges with HPMF’s peacemaking mission with the shared value to treat each person with dignity and respect. We hold in common the value to seek reconciliation and cooperation by better understanding rejecting violence.
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