wfn.org | Bible Academy graduates reunite

[Beth Hawn]

Microsoft Mail v3.0 (MAPI 1.0 Transport) IPM.Microsoft Mail.Note
To:  'Worldwide Faith News'
Date: 1998-07-01 14:53
Priority: 3
Message ID: A7899783E410D211AAB0006008075ABF
Conversation ID: Bible Academy graduates reunite 

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July 1, 1998
Mennonite Board of Missions
Beth Hawn
219-294-7523
<News@MBM.org>

Bible Academy graduates reunite during Ethiopian church meeting

ELKHART, Ind. (MBM) - Although participants at last weekend's Friends of
Meserete Kristos Church conference came primarily on church business,   
some
made special time for a little business of their own.

Some 45 former students, staff and friends of the Bible Academy High   
School in
Nazareth, Ethiopia, took the afternoons off from the conference to catch   
up
and get reacquainted. "We used the occasion to have a reunion," said   
Zenebe
 Abebe, a member of the class of 1971.

This was the first-ever reunion of the Mennonite high school, which was
opened in 1959 by Eastern Mennonite Missions workers. According to Abebe,   

many of these students hadn't seen each other in more than 25 years.   
Among
those attending were the school's founder, Chester Wenger, and a member   
of
the first graduating class, Tilahun Beyene.

"I wish everyone could be here," Beyene said. "This is so wonderful."

Beyene graduated in 1963 with five others. When the Ethiopian government
took over the school in the early 1980s, 250 students were enrolled.

Bible Academy students will keep making reunions an order of business.   
"We
will continue to meet during the MKC conferences," Abebe said. "In fact,
we already formed a committee to plan it."

* * *

Rachel Lewis