Amanda K Gross '06, MA '13 is an anti-racist organizer and artist living and working on the original land of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She blogs about the interconnectedness of racism, patriarchy, capitalism, and white womanhood at MistressSyndrome.com and is currently working on a full-length book on that same theme. ... read more about Loving the Enemy Within: Grounding in the trauma-healing work of anti-racism from Menno Snapshots
Ryan and Janie Beuthin and their three children grow flowers in an adjacent vacant lot in the Mott Park neighborhood. Ryan is a 2011 Center for Justice and Peacebuilding graduate and Janie worked in the CJP office. ... read more about Flint family uses vacant lot for cut flower business from Flintside
Michael Greene '76, who was been coaching for over 40 years, leaves Park View as its longest tenured coach with 30 years of service at the high school. He is married to Bonnie Showalter Greene '77, whom he met at EMU. ... read more about Park View baseball coach retires after 30 years from Brunswick Times-Gazette
"So-called 'racial reconciliation' is primarily a white Christian attempt to remedy the tension in American race relations. But from a black perspective, racism is not so much interpersonal as institutional." Read the full article by Dr. David Evans, associate professor of history and intercultural studies at Eastern Mennonite Seminary. ... read more about Christianity Today: Professor David Evans on ‘racial reconciliation’ from Christianity Today
Danita Rountree Green shares about Coming to the Table in Richmond, Virginia (CTTT-RVA), a local nonprofit that invites people to engage in the sharing of stories at the table where food and facilitation become the perfect ingredients for spawning new friendships across the racial divide. We invite you to meet the ever-growing CTTT-RVA family and join us as we deal with our country’s oldest problem: the legacy of enslavement and the racism it has spawned. We are excited about our work: taking disparate stories and developing a shared narrative leading to healing. CTTT orginated at EMU. ... read more about The Presbyterian Outlook features Richmond chapter of Coming To The Table from The Presbyterian Outlook
If we’re paying attention, and many have been, the Fire, the Pandemic, and the Uprising proclaim that all this smoke, disease, and unrest are related to respiration, and the violence and waste that blocks it. When I’m paying attention, this year teaches me that Hindsight is 2020. I should’ve known better, and so should many others. ... read more about Jonathan McRay MA ’13: On paying attention to the Fire, the Pandemic and the Uprising, and our own 2020 vision from Resilience.org
The Harrisonburg Rockingham Chamber of Commerce hosted its annual presidential address on Thursday, August 13, 2020. The presidents from James Madison University, Bridgewater College, Blue Ridge Community College and Eastern Mennonite University all spoke on behalf of their schools, emphasizing the challenges they have faced and their plans to move forward. ... read more about WHSV-3: President Huxman joins area higher ed leaders at annual chamber address from WHSV-3
Reclaimed police funds could be distributed to shelters, rape crisis centers, mental health services and programs to combat sexual violence, experts say ... Community-driven responses to sexual violence like transformative justice offer some insight on how that might come to fruition. While there is no single definition, transformative justice could be broadly defined as a “framework that doesn’t depend on solving violence with another form of violence,” Johonna Turner, an assistant professor of restorative justice and peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University, said. ... read more about NBC News: Professor Johonna Turner on ‘defund the police’ movement and new paths to justice for sexual assault survivors from NBC News
EMU student Kate Szambecki urges action now: 'We are living a civil rights movement right now — amplified by a pandemic as well as economic, mental health and health-care crises. You weren’t involved in the past? Now is your chance.' ... read more about Kate Szambecki on the current civil rights movement: ‘Passive before? Be active now.’ from The Mennonite World Review
One thing haiku calls for, and what is often least found but most needed in times of war or its aftermath, is the ability to pause and be in the moment. Read more on the art of haiku and peacebuilding with poet John Paul Lederach, founding director of EMU's Center for Justice and Peacebuilding, ... read more about John Paul Lederach on the power and pause of pandemic haiku from Notre Dame