wfn.org | Re: Christmas bundles

[Mennonite Central Committee Communications]

TOPIC:  Fifty-year friendship results from Christmas bundle sent to Europe
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

AKRON, Pa. --  A note tucked into a Mennonite Central Committee
(MCC) Christmas bundle sent to post-World War II Europe has
resulted in a 50-year, trans-Atlantic friendship.

Pennsylvania resident Salinda Stolzfus Weber recalls how in the mid-
1940s her older sister responded to MCC's request for Christmas
bundles -- clothing, soap and a few other items wrapped in a bath
towel -- for people in war-ravaged Europe.

MCC encouraged North Americans to include their addresses, and soon
Salinda's sister began receiving letters from the teen-age girl in
Holland who had received her bundle.  At Salinda's prodding, her
sister inquired whether her new Dutch friend could find a pen pal for
Salinda.  She suggested her cousin, Corey Stokvis -- Corey Barthel
since her marriage.

Salinda and Corey have been writing, visiting and phoning ever since,
with the exception of a period of years when the two temporarily lost
contact.

Salinda, now 65, keeps a photo album with carefully handwritten
captions detailing the decades of this "treasured friendship."  The first
pages show Corey, about 16, with a saucy smile and fashionably
bobbed hair.  Near the end is a gray-haired Corey relaxing in her
garden with her grown children.  In the middle are photos of Salinda
and Corey, with their husbands, visiting in each other's homes.

After dozens of letters, the two first met in 1987 when Salinda and her
husband, Floyd, traveled to Holland.  "I was nervous," admits Salinda. 
"What if we didn't like each other?"  Her fears were unfounded.

"It was like coming home," says Salinda, as she and Corey found
much in common.  Their husbands also became fast friends.

In 1989 Corey and her husband, Karel, visited the United States.  "I'm
afraid to fly but if it means visiting you, then I fly," wrote Corey, who
arrived safely and enjoyed her stay.  Since then Salinda and Floyd
have visited Holland two more times.

Despite the miles that separate them, Salinda's and Corey's lives have
remarkable parallels.  Both women live close to their birthplaces --
Salinda near Morgantown, Pa., and Corey, in Hilversum, Holland. 
Both have two daughters and one son who are approximately the same
ages.  Both were homemakers who enjoyed needlework and flowers. 
Both gardened, and canned and froze vegetables and fruits for their
families.

Their memories of World War II, however, are much different. 
Salinda recalls the ration stamps needed to buy sugar and shoes, and
seeing German prisoners-of-war picking potatoes at a nearby farm in
Pennsylvania.  Corey remembers gnawing hunger, marauding soldiers
and the terror of night-time bombing that made her cower in bed with
blankets over her head.

A sad look enters Salinda's eyes as she relates one area in which the
two friends don't agree.  "Many years ago I shared with Corey my
belief in God," relates Salinda.  "She said she couldn't believe it
herself.  However, we remain friends."

Recently when Corey's husband underwent heart surgery, she tearfully
phoned Salinda.  Salinda said she would pray, and enlisted six of her
brothers and sisters to do the same.  Corey said she was grateful.

Today Salinda's and Corey's sons -- Mark and Edwin -- continue their
mother's tradition of friendship.  The two first met when Edwin visited
the United States with his parents.  Since then the two men, in their
mid-30s, have kept in touch through letters and phone calls.

                               -30-

10october1997

Pearl Sensenig is a writer/editor in the MCC communications
department.

MCC photo available:  Salinda Weber with a picture Corey Barthel
painted for her.  On the back Corey wrote, "To my dear friend,
Salinda, who lives far away, but you are always in my heart."  When
an anxious Salinda recently took a painting class, Corey reassured her,
saying, "Of course you can do it; you're my `sister.'"   The
Pennsylvania and Holland residents became friends through a note
slipped into an MCC Christmas bundle sent to post-World War II
Europe.  (MCC photo by Pearl Sensenig)  TOPIC:  Sidebar:  MCC requests updated version of "Christma
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

AKRON, Pa. -- Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) is currently
requesting an updated version of the "Christmas bundle" that Salinda
Weber's sister assembled many years ago, and is again encouraging
North Americans to include their names and addresses.  MCC wants to
collect 4,000 "Comfort 'n Joy bundles" for refugees in the former
Yugoslavia.  Bundles should include:  comforter or blanket, deodorant
stick, hairbrush and comb, bath towel, toothpaste, four toothbrushes,
four bars of bath soap, package of disposable razors, mittens or gloves
(adult or child sizes), hard candy, Christmas card with flat ornament or
photo (optional) and a new, small stuffed animal.  These items should
be wrapped in the comforter or blanket, and delivered to your local
MCC office. Contact your local MCC office for deadline.  MCC also
asks for $5 to cover shipping costs.

As well, if you know of friendships formed through Christmas bundles
-- similar to Salinda and Corey's story -- or through other MCC
material resource projects, please send information to MCC
Communications, 21 South 12th Street, Akron, PA  17501-0500;
phone:  (717) 859-1151; e-mail:  mailbox@mcc.org

                               -30-

pls10october1997TOPIC:  Mennonite Church in eastern Congo baptizes 10 new members
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

A joint release of Mennonite Central Committee, Africa Inter-
Mennonite Mission and Mennonite Brethren Missions/Services 
by Krista Rigalo

BUKAVU, Congo -- As mist rose off Lake Kivu at 7 a.m., August 24,
1997, Pastor Philemon Begela baptized 10 new members into the
Mennonite Church of the Great Lakes.  One by one the new members
"died" and were reborn with Christ.

While all baptisms are cause for joy, this baptism was special.  The
Mennonite church in Bukavu, eastern Congo (formerly Zaire), was
planted on March 7, 1996, by Congolese lay missionaries as an
outreach program of the Congolese Mennonite Churches.

The new church attracted members from all ethnic groups and tribes, a
rarity in this region torn by ethnic tension.  Tired of war and drawn by
Anabaptist teachings on peace, people from all backgrounds -- local
people and Rwandan and Burundian refugees as well as several street
children -- began praying together.

The Begelas, a Congolese missionary couple, were slated to come from
Kinshasa, the country's capital, to Bukavu to assume the pastorate
when war broke out in eastern Congo in October 1996.  Rebels
advanced and took ever increasing amounts of territory, separating the
church and its intended pastor.  Though divided by war, both the
pastor and the congregation continued to pray for an eventual uniting.

Finally, one and a half years later, the Begelas arrived in Bukavu. 
Against all odds, they found an alive, vibrant church, one that not only
survived a devastating war, but one that was growing and had 10
baptismal candidates to present.  The church, however, had lost some
members during the war, including two young men caught in the cross
fire and several Rwandan refugees whose whereabouts are still
unknown.

As the sun glistened off the lake, we thought of our brothers and
sisters no longer with us, but were reminded of how gracious God is
and how much we have ultimately gained.
                               -30-
pls10october1997
Krista Rigalo, an MCC worker in eastern Congo, is from Crystal
River, Fla.  She is a member of the Mennonite Brethren Church of
Congo and is affiliated with Riverside Christian Fellowship in
Hernando, Fla.
MCC Photo available: Pastor Philemon Begela baptizes Jean de Dieu,
a Rwandan orphan who, prior to the war, lived in an orphanage
partially sponsored by MCC.  When war broke out in eastern Congo in
March 1996, Jean de Dieu fled into the forest with the other Rwandan
refugees.  However, at the first opportunity, he made his way back to
Bukavu and is now sheltered in the home of a member of the
Mennonite Church of the Great Lakes.  Sponsored by a U.S.
Mennonite family, Jean de Dieu is now an apprentice learning
carpentry. (MCC photo by Fidele Lumeya)TOPIC:  When God keeps sending the enemy into your house
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Emily Will
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

by David Morrow
Note to editors: If you wish to make major changes or cuts in this
article, please check with David Morrow before doing so.  He can
be reached at phone/fax (509) 349-2444 or via e-mail at
<morrow@televar.com>.

WARDEN, Wash. -- Many years ago, while pastoring a Presbyterian
church in Arkansas, I led a Bible study on Matthew's injunction to
love our enemies.

I began by asking, "Who are your enemies?"  No response.  No one
seemed to have any.  I pressed them further.  Were they not being
honest about their feelings?  But then I asked myself the same
question.  Who are my enemies?  I couldn't think of anyone either.  I
was a nice guy.  Everyone liked me.  I didn't have any enemies.

But then I went to El Salvador, a country at war where enemies
seemed to abound.  Most of the war's victims were civilians whom the
army had labelled "enemies."

Before beginning our Mennonite Central Committee (MCC)
assignment in El Salvador, my wife, Irene, and I read about the army's
treatment of "enemies."  We knew their record of torture, assassination
and massacre.  And we decided who our enemy would be.  Our enemy
would be the army.

While we never suffered the army's repression as did our Salvadoran
neighbors, we did experience irritation and minor abuse.  The day we
moved into our home in the little town of Sesori, we found a platoon
of soldiers in our backyard.  Throughout our four years there, soldiers
were in and around our house.  At night they'd lie outside singing,
swearing and smoking marijuana -- a gang of stoned teen-agers with
automatic weapons.  Camped on our doorstep.
The "enemy" takes us for guerrillas

For their part, the army was understandably suspicious of us.  What
were a couple of gringos with a baby doing in the middle of a war
zone?  We could only be guerrillas or guerrilla sympathizers, so they
repeatedly stopped and questioned us.  Occasionally they came to our
house to investigate.

One afternoon when Irene and baby Nathan were alone in the house, a
knock came.  It was a sergeant and a private, sent by their colonel. 
They asked the usual: Who are you?  For whom do you work? Do you
ever go into the countryside?  Irene replied in the cool, brusque
manner with which we usually addressed soldiers.

Then Nathan awakened from his nap.  "!Que chulo! (How cute!)" the
soldiers exclaimed.  No more questions.  They spent the rest of their
visit oohing and aahing over Nathan, a common reaction but not one
Irene expected from soldiers.  She didn't expect the normal human
response to a baby from them.  And quite frankly, it irritated her.

Their reaction contradicted her image of soldiers as brutes incapable of
warmth, affection, tenderness.  The prime strategy in war is to
dehumanize the enemy -- and that is what both she and I had done. 
Theologically we were pacifists, but psychologically we had become
participants in war.

El Salvador was still at war when we returned to the States in 1990. 
Neither was there peace in our lives.  We had grown personally and
spiritually, we had learned much from Salvadoran Christians about
faith amid suffering.  But the war had left within us a residue of anger
and bitterness -- anger at the violence and injustice, and bitterness
toward those who perpetrated it.
The "enemy" asks a favor  

We began working with refugees in Harlingen, Texas, a Mennonite
Board of Missions assignment.  One Sunday we were invited to give a
presentation on El Salvador at Iglesia Menonita del Cordero, the
Mennonite church in Brownsville, Texas.

After the service a friend introduced Irene to a Salvadoran man.  Irene
greeted him warmly and explained where we had lived in El Salvador.

"I know," he said. "I remember you.  You lived in the house next to
the Baptist church.  You had a cute little boy you'd push around town
in a little wooden cart.  I used to be a sergeant in the army.  I came to
your house one day."

This was the soldier who had cooed over Nathan some four years
earlier, the soldier we had dismissed as our enemy -- and God's.  His
name, which Irene hadn't bothered to find out that afternoon, was
Doroteo.

That evening Doroteo phoned.  His political asylum hearing was
coming up; could I translate for him?

"Can't someone else do it?" I asked.  No, no one else could.

"I really can't translate for you without first hearing your story," I
protested.  He would be happy to meet with me.  He would come to
my house -- tomorrow.

This encounter with Doroteo was strange and unsettling.  I didn't want
him in our house!  I felt like Ananias when the Lord told him to go
and meet Saul after Saul had been blinded. No, Lord!  I know this
man's past!  He's a man of violence!

And Doroteo had been a man of violence.  His battalion had a horrible
record of atrocities.  The husband of one of our neighbors in Sesori
had been murdered by members of this battalion, his body dumped
down a well.  Doroteo was my enemy.
The "enemy" shares his story

The next morning I greeted Doroteo a little more warmly than Irene
had in Sesori.  He sat down and related his story ...

Doroteo had joined the military in 1980, and became a member of one
of the elite special forces battalions trained by the U.S. military. 
Whenever his battalion was in the Sesori area, Doroteo's job was to
spy on us.  He staked out our house, watched our movements,
investigated what we were doing.

Doroteo had come to our home twice. By his second visit he was
convinced we were affiliated with the guerrillas, and had reported this
to his commander.  After learning Irene was a nurse, Doroteo
presumed we were health workers supporting a clinic that treated
wounded guerrillas.  In actuality, Irene trained church health promoters
and worked in a small rural pharmacy.

In 1989 Doroteo was critically wounded in a battle right outside our
town.  During his months of convalescence he decided to get out of
the army.  He asked three times to be relieved of his duties; three
times he was denied.  Clearly his superiors didn't want him to leave
the army -- alive.  He knew too much.

Doroteo feared that when he returned to the battlefield, the army
would find a way for him to be killed.  So he deserted.  Not out of
Christian conviction.  Doroteo was not a Christian.  In addition to the
violence in which he had taken part, Doroteo had lived a life of drugs,
alcohol and carousing.

Yet within him there was a desire to change, a recognition that only
God could do the changing.  So he left El Salvador with the hope of
finding both safety and conversion.

After a six-month journey through Mexico, he crossed the Rio Grande
into Brownsville, where he met Irma and Juan Arambaru of the
Mennonite church there.  They invited him to services. He stopped
drinking and doing drugs, and committed his life to Christ.  He even
experienced a call to the ministry. 
The "enemy" is baptized

Something about Doroteo's story, something about his humble manner,
rang true.  Not only did I agree to translate for his asylum hearing, but
Irene and I also began to visit with him at church.  We were privileged
to attend his baptism -- in January's icy waters on the Gulf of Mexico.

About that time I decided to search for a pastorate in the Mennonite
Church.  As a Presbyterian I had never received believers' baptism, so
I asked our pastor to baptize me.  He did so, at the same beach where
Doroteo had been baptized six months earlier.  My own rebirth in
Christ had occurred 15 years earlier.  Yet as I rose out of the
baptismal waters I felt I had new life, a new opportunity for
something.

Later that year we moved here to Warden, where I had accepted a call
to pastor the Mennonite church.  About the same time, Doroteo moved
to Kansas to work and study at the Anabaptist Biblical Institute.  We
kept in touch and several times Doroteo said he might like to move to
Washington.  We doubted he would ever really do so.

Then last summer, the phone rang early one Sunday morning.  It was
Doroteo, calling from a pay phone about six blocks away.  He had
finally decided to move to Washington and asked if he could stay with
us for a while.

Over the following days Irene and I spent hours with Doroteo,
reminiscing about El Salvador and hearing more of his story.  Those
conversations helped Irene find healing for much of the residual
bitterness from our El Salvador years.   And I began to understand the
new opportunity God had given me at my baptism.
The "enemy" becomes friend, colleague

It was an opportunity to love my enemies as God loved me.  As Irene
put it, "God has sent the enemy to our house."  God sent him to our
house in El Salvador, God sent him to our house in Texas, God sent
him to our house here in Washington.   God keeps sending the enemy
to our house until we learn to love him.

A year has passed and Doroteo still lives with us.  He has started an
Hispanic congregation at our church.

As for me, I still feel like Ananias.  But now I feel like Ananias when
he met Saul for the first time -- and greeted him with the words,
"Brother Saul!"  Brother Saul.  Ananias had learned what I now have
learned.  There are many biblical reasons to love my enemy, but
perhaps the most simple is that my enemy today may one day be my
brother.

                               -30-

David Morrow

esw10october1997

David and Irene Morrow served in El Salvador with MCC from 1986
to 1990.  Two sons, Nathan and Joel, were born there, and they are in
the process of adopting Andrew, age 1.  David now pastors Warden
(Washington) Mennonite Church and Irene is a family nurse
practitioner at a migrant health center. Doroteo Rivera pastors Mision
Evangelica Manantiales de Vida Eterna, also in Warden. 

MCC photo available:  David Morrow and Doroteo Rivera, former
enemies and now colleagues in Christ, at their shared congregational
home. (MCC photo by Irene Morrow)TOPIC:  MCC news photo:  Away in a manger ... in Laos
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

VIENTIANE, Laos --  "I like this work because our whole family can
be together," says Mon Sipasert (right).  Over the past year she and
sons, Bounthanom (center), and Som Nuk, along with two other family
members sawed, hammered and wove some 1,000 miniature, thatched-
roof stables.  The wooden stables, fashioned after traditional, Laotian-
style houses, are part of creche sets available in many North American
stores that sell Ten Thousand Villages products.

Like most Laotians, Mon Sipasert and her family are Buddhist, but
they say they have heard how Jesus was born in a stable.  Although
they may not embrace the theological implications of the Christmas
story, they can well understand how it feels to be poor with no place
to stay.

After several bad harvests the family left their farm to find jobs near
the city.  So far a better life has evaded them, but their work building
stables gives them hope.  Jan Fong Sinnachack, the father, says with
the money they earn he dreams of buying some chickens, and maybe
eventually a rice field.

Ten Thousand Villages, a Mennonite Central Committee (MCC)
income generation program, provides income for thousands of families
throughout the world.  For more information about Christmas items
and other products carried by Ten Thousand Villages, phone (717)
859-8100, in Canada, (519) 662-1879, or visit Web site
www.villages.ca  (MCC photo by Mark Beach)

                               -30-

pls10october1997TOPIC:  Winter is fast approaching, but many Detroit storm victims can't find help 
their homes
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

by Delphine R. Martin

DETROIT -- Rehoboth Baptist Church in south Detroit dubs itself "an
oasis of comfort in a desert of calamity."  The building stands amid
piles of crumbling blocks, a reminder of the severe storm and
tornadoes that swept through several Detroit communities more than
three months ago.  

With winter fast approaching, neighborhoods surrounding the church
show how far the "desert of calamity" stretches.  Many chimneys lie in
rubble on tarp-covered roofs.  Other roofs still gape open.  Although
Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) has been working in Detroit since
the July 2 storms, a shortage of volunteers has temporarily stalled
repairs.

"Money is not the problem.  Materials are not the problem.  Places to
work are not the problem.  We have a shortage of volunteers," says
Virgil Kauffman, MDS Detroit project director.

During the weeks following the disaster, MDS averaged between 20
and 50 volunteers per week, according to Kauffman.  But by
September's end, MDS was relying on a handful of long-term
volunteers.  Leola Kauffman, who answers phone calls for assistance,
says, "[Whenever it rains] people call in, asking, `Did you forget about
me? When are you coming [to my house]?'"

The answer, she says, is "when we get volunteers."

Shortly after the storm, MDS workers worked on a new house roof for
Norma Williams, a senior citizen who lives several blocks from
Rehoboth Church.  But since then, she has not found help to finish
repairs.

"If it was not for [MDS], I would still be sitting in an open house,"
she said.  As proof that help is slow in coming, she points to her
two-car garage, now in a pile in her back yard, awaiting removal by
city officials.

The extent of storm damage is still being discovered.  Following the
storm, officials from the Federal Emergency Management Association
(FEMA) reported receiving 11,000 applications for assistance. 
Generally 60 percent of all applications received are found valid. 
According to FEMA official Tim Richardson, the application deadline
has been extended twice, raising the number of applications to nearly
19,000.

"We were expecting half that," Richardson said.  "At one point we
were getting 200 to 300 applications per day." 

Many city and relief officials suspect the number of people needing
assistance is actually greater than FEMA applications suggest. 
Because the tornado swept through economically impoverished
neighborhoods, many residents simply don't know what assistance is
available or how to get it.

JoAnne Clock, coordinator for the mayor's senior citizen and homeless
programs, says many storm victims are senior citizens who are
"medically frail and lacking the capacity" to make the phone calls and
fill out forms for getting assistance.  Therefore, part of Kauffman's job
involves identifying individuals who have not sought assistance and
encouraging them to do so.

One storm victim, Anita Gist, learned from MDS volunteers working
on a house next to hers that she was eligible for federal assistance. 
She has just begun the application process and says her roof, chimney
and rain gutters need to be replaced.

"I didn't realize how bad the roof was until the bedroom walls began
to swell, and I saw the rain run down the front doorway," she says. 
With the onset of cooler weather, she admits to having turned on the
heat, although she has no chimney.

The approaching winter is not the only concern of these Detroit
residents.  Mary-Suzanne Bante, who works with the Archdiocese of
Detroit, says many people are afraid to leave their homes because they
fear their belongings will be stolen.  Because of this, many people
continue to live in substandard housing.  

Other residents stay simply because they have nowhere else to go. 
One storm victim, Uronda Bolton of west Detroit, says her neighbors
continue to live in their home, although half the roof is gone. 
According to Bolton, they would rather stay in their home than go to a
shelter.

                               -30-

pls10october1997

Delphine R. Martin is a free-lance writer from Lancaster, Pa., who
visited Detroit September 27 to 29. 

MCC photo available:  Virgil Kauffman, MDS Detroit project director,
discusses repairs with homeowner Donna Hankins.  July 2 storms
damaged Hankins house, which was already in disrepair.  She had
purchased the abandoned house from the city for $1 a year earlier. 
Like many others, Hankins' home provides her only alternative to
living in a shelter.  (MCC photo by Delphine R. Martin) TOPIC:  Sidebar:  "We need volunteers" is m
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

DETROIT --     How do you turn on the heat when the chimney has
been destroyed?  How do you keep out the wind, rain and snow when
there is a hole in the roof -- or no roof at all?  These are dilemmas
being faced by residents of Detroit where a July tornado damaged
many homes.  

Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) in Detroit is trying to help storm
victims, but the agency's work is hampered by lack of volunteers. 
Virgil Kauffman, MDS Detroit project manager, dreams of what could
be done if MDS had 40 volunteers experienced in roofing, masonry
and general construction.  He says he would form several repair crews
to fan across Detroit, helping residents prepare to face the brunt of
winter.

Now, with so few MDS volunteers available, Kauffman has to make
tough decisions.  Should MDS volunteers be putting tarps on roofs --
which takes just half a day -- or devote more time to permanently
repairing a few roofs?  In addition to roofing, Kauffman is also
prioritizing repairs on chimneys and windows.  With the first of
October, he has begun coordinating furnace inspections in basements
that were flooded.

For information on how you can volunteer in Detroit, phone (313)
964-2856.

                               -30-

pls10october1997TOPIC:  Sidebar:  Detroit resident builds "up from the rubble" --
twice
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

by Delphine R. Martin

DETROIT -- Recently Wornice McDonald pawned the wedding rings
she has owned for 27 years for money to repair her chimney.

Ever since a July 2 tornado trundled down her street and through her
yard, McDonald has been trying to shore up her house against the
approaching Detroit winter.  But without a chimney, her furnace stands
up to winter like a scarecrow to a tornado.

McDonald had moved into her house just four months before the
storm.  She was in the process of purchasing it for $1 under a city
program that allows residents to buy abandoned properties to refurbish. 
After selecting her future home, she had worked for three days to
clean out trash, and then several more months repairing walls and
installing wiring.  

When the tornado ripped through her yard, it tore out the wiring, and
deposited a fresh load of debris in her back yard.  It also tore off her
roof.

"Y'all going to have a vacant lot again. I can't get the roof put on," a
discouraged Wornice told her neighbors after the storm.  That's when
a local pastor put McDonald in touch with Mennonite Disaster Service
(MDS).

"I didn't know what to do, and along came a bus of angels,"
McDonald said, referring to the crew of MDS volunteers who put a
new roof on her house.        Since then, McDonald says hiring
construction crews has been difficult.  "When Virgil and them left, all
the men left," McDonald said, referring to MDS project director, Virgil
Kauffman and the MDS volunteers.  Kauffman acknowledges that
finding construction crews is difficult because of the numerous storm-
damaged homes around the city.

While McDonald estimates her project will take two years to complete,
her house is slowly being restored to its condition prior to the tornado.
Once again, lights hang from wiring, waiting for inspection.  Yet her
most pressing concern is repairing the chimney before cold weather
sets in.

After that, she hopes she can buy back her rings.  
-30-
pls10october1997
Delphine R. Martin is a free-lance writer from Lancaster, Pa., who
visited Detroit September 27 to 29. 
MCC photo available:  Wornice McDonald and Rev. Bob Hansen of
St. Olaf Lutheran Church in Detroit celebrate communion together. 
The ceremony commemorated the joint effort of homeowners, MDS
and local volunteers to repair storm-damaged homes in the community
that day.  "Pastor Bob" was the person who referred McDonald to
MDS.  MDS volunteers replaced McDonald's roof.  (MCC photo by
Delphine R. Martin)TOPIC:  Sidebar:  In Detroit and other places, MDS needs more long-term voluntee
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

DETROIT -- In one year's time, Leonard Mast of Nappanee, Ind., has
worked in Kentucky, Texas and Michigan.  In Texas, he lived in a tool
shed, and now his current home in Detroit is a room on the third floor
of a vacated nursing home.

As a Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) long-term volunteer, Mast has
witnessed the havoc natural disasters wreak on communities and
helped people rebuild their homes and lives.  While the bulk of MDS
work is accomplished by short-term volunteers from churches and
youth groups, MDS is seeking volunteers willing to commit two
months or longer.

According to Virgil Kauffman, MDS project director in Detroit, long-
term volunteers can become more familiar with the people with whom
they are working and can help local coordinators provide direction for
the projects.  Mast agrees that long-term volunteers bring an added
benefit to disaster projects.  "There's a lot of inside planning, and
people who come for a week don't get in for that," he said.

Currently MDS needs long-term volunteers to work in Michigan,
California and Arkansas.  In addition to construction workers, they
also need cooks and office help.  Mast, who had no construction
experience prior working with MDS, says the only qualifications
needed are "patience and a good attitude."

Those interested in working long term with MDS should contact Carla
Hunt by calling (717) 859-2210, or by writing to MDS, P.O. Box 500,
Akron, PA, 17501.  The MDS e-mail address is
menno_disaster_service@ecunet.org.

                               -30-

pls10october1997TOPIC:  Two events display Mennonite concern over U.S. gun violence
DATE:   October 13, 1997
CONTACT:  Pearl Sensenig
V: 717/859-1151 F: 717/859-2171
E-MAIL ADDRESS:  mailbox@mcc.org

AKRON, Pa. -- Two actions in two locales on September 19 marked
Mennonites' concern about gun violence in the United States.

In Washington, some 200 people gathered at a plaza across the street
from the District of Columbia police headquarters and mayor's office -
- a few blocks north of the Smithsonian mall -- to dedicate Esther and
Michael Augsburgers' "Guns into Plowshares" sculpture.

And here in Akron, the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) U.S.
Executive Committee adopted a statement decrying gun violence. 
Committee members encouraged MCC supporters to consider giving
up any handguns they may have in their homes and to support
legislative efforts to strengthen gun control at the national level.

For the past three years, Mennonite artist and District of Columbia
resident Esther Augsburger and her son, Michael, have been working
on a 16-foot-high sculpture of a plowshare.  It partly consists of some
3,000 guns collected by the Metropolitan Police Department of
Washington.

The plow represents peace as imaged in the Old Testament Scripture
of Isaiah 2:4 -- "They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their
spears into pruning forks."

The project was carried out with the encouragement and support of the

Metropolitan Police Department of Washington and InterChurch, Inc.,
an inter-denominational organization. 

Police departments aren't usually known as patrons of the arts but the
Washington police officials gladly donated the guns -- collected in a
buy-back program -- for the sculpture.  Perhaps they did so because
they intimately know statistics about gun violence, some of which are
listed in the MCC U.S. statement on U.S. Gun Violence:

More than one out of three U.S. households own firearms.

Handguns, which constitute one-third of all U.S. firearms, account for
two-thirds of firearm crime and more than 80 percent of all firearm
homicides.

Although most people believe they are buying protection when they
obtain a handgun, owning one increases rather than decreases one's
risk of death and injury.  It is 43 times more likely that a handgun
kept in the home will be used against its owner, a family member or
friend than against an intruder.

In 1992, handguns murdered 13,220 people in the United States --
compared to 33 victims in Great Britain, 128 in Canada and 60 in
Japan.  Of the countries tracked by the United Nations, only Brazil and
Jamaica have a higher firearm death rate than the United States.

Who knows how many deaths were caused by the 3,000 guns used in
the Augsburgers' sculpture?  Their artistic work can visually remind
people that such violence need not continue.  God desires that
instruments of death be converted to implements of life and growth.

The MCC U.S. statement encourages people of faith to give up any
guns kept for personal defense purposes "as an example to our
neighbors of our commitment to non-violence in a society that has
become engulfed by violence."

The MCC U.S. Washington Office has assembled a Gun Violence
packet to provide information and suggestions for action.  To order the
packet, contact the MCC Washington Office, 110 Maryland Ave. N.E.,
Washington, D.C. 20002; phone (202) 544-6564; e-mail
<mccwash@igc.apc.org>.  Price for a single copy is $3.

                               -30-

esw10october1997

MCC photo available:  From the left, Michael I. Fitzgerald, assistant
chief, Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia,
Cora Masters Barry, wife of D.C. Mayor Marian Barry, and sculptors
Esther and Michael Augsburger at the September 19 dedication of the
Augsburgers' "Guns Into Plowshares" sculpture.  (MCC photo by Karl
Shelly)