Bigger World RBC Students Go to Europe
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
RBC Feature LIVING IN A BIGGER WORLD RBC students go to Europe In Europe, touching history moves By Vicki Sairs faith deeper for RBC students When 22 Rosedale Bible College students landed in Paris Spencer Lehman, 21, from Chambersburg, Pa., thought of on January 24 this year, they had some idea what to expect. the tour as a journey “similar to the journey of my ancestors,” They’d just spent half of winter term immersed in two inten- he said. “Periodically, I would try to step back and imagine the sive courses: Introduction to Humanities, and Mennonites, terrain, the cities, the people. What was it like? Did Conrad Anabaptists and the Radical Reformation (MARR). Grebel see this church from where my feet are planted? Did They were prepared to see great art; they were ready Ulrich Zwingli walk down this cobblestone street?” to visit places where Anabaptists found shelter or a mar- Lehman wondered how his ancestors from Bern and tyr’s death. They were even willing to brave the coldest the Emmental Valley experienced life. Did they know at European winter in decades to do these things. the time what their influence would be? “And I ask myself, What did they find? where is my journey taking me?” Left: Ken Miller at the Pantheon. Middle: Spencer Lehman looks at the names of people who could be his ancestors in Switzerland. Right: Megan Troyer and Reuben Sairs in the cloister of the Basler Muenster Church in Basel, Switzerland. Left: The members of Rosedale Bible College’s Europe Tour, on the steps of the Haut Koenigsbourg Castle in France. The photographer, Karl Delagrange, is not in the photo. (Karl Delagrange) The teachers who planned and led the tour, Ken others who share my beliefs.” Miller (Humanities) and Reuben Sairs (MARR), share the It was much more than that, though. She felt the names college’s goal of encouraging students to engage the culture were a way of saying, “I was here, I saw this, I recognize around them and to live in a bigger world. “For the MARR this.” It’s an acknowledgement, she said, that the perse- class,” said Sairs, “the study tour isn’t about visiting the cution that was going on is still remembered. “They [the past, but rather about owning our faith for the future.” Anabaptists] were in that tower, but we’re still going back Sairs stressed that those who established our approach and visiting this today . we’re remembering them.” to Christian life, faith and practice, were real people, “not [Editor’s note: please note that no Rosedale student on this wooden actors in a movie or woodcuts in the Martyrs tour contributed to the graffiti – under threat of defenestration!] Mirror.” The question, he said, isn’t whether they believed Megan Troyer, 19, from Elida, Ohio, had an epiphany these things. “It is whether we still believe these things.” while walking the streets of Strasbourg. When she was Miller hoped that students would appreciate the tal- a child, her family read stories about the reformers and ent of the artists who created such magnificent works. Anabaptists, but always from a child’s point of view – the “Looking at the brush strokes of an original painting or son or daughter of Menno Simons, or an apprentice to a at the grooves cut into the stone of a sculpture, or being printer, for example. dwarfed by the cavernous space of a cathedral, gives stu- “It was always the adults in the story who had to strug- dents a chance to feel the presence of the artist and think, gle and defend biblical truth, who broke with the Roman ‘Someone actually accomplished this.’” It’s a different feel- Catholic Church or were excommunicated from it, who faced ing, said Miller, than looking at a 3x5 plate in the textbook. charges of heresy and threats of burning at the stake, and the This proved true for Fidelia Renne, 17, from Milford realization of those threats, “ she said. “The children in the Center, Ohio. She was moved by “seeing the cathedrals, stories fear for the parents’ lives, but never their own, and being inside them.” People from evangelical and maybe I’ve tended to view the reformation with this perspective.” Mennonite backgrounds “tend to think Christianity got In Strasbourg, she realized that the people in those started after the Reformation,” she said. stories were only a few years older than she is. “As much “Being there made me realize there are more real as it frightened me to admit it, I was now one of the stories’ believers trying to serve God.” She acknowledges that adults.” The men and women in the stories didn’t look like opinions vary on the “opulence” of the cathedrals, and she’s her parents anymore; they looked like her. aware of the problems in the church at the time. “But even “And although I like to think that I know the Bible, if the authorities messed it up,” she said, “God’s presence I disappointed myself when I wondered, am I as much a was there. There were believers, trying to serve God.” student of God’s word as they? Have I studied to the extent Stephanie Moore, 19, from Hazard, Ky., found that the that I can assess life and the church from a biblical perspec- first three weeks of class study paid off. “I could point out tive and articulate what I understand to be God’s truth?” the flying buttresses on Gothic cathedrals and know the (A shorter version of this article appeared in the March 5, story behind the plaque about the drowning of Anabaptist 2012 Mennonite Weekly Review.) Felix Manz.” The group visited Trachselwald Castle near Bern, More thoughts from Switzerland, where Anabaptists had been imprisoned. our students: Emily Maust, 20, from Salisbury, Pa., was surprised by her reaction to seeing the names of present-day visitors Ben Herr, 23 (Lancaster, Pa.): scrawled on the inside walls of the tower. “I loved it! Basically, for the first bit of the MARR Seeing all the names of the people on the wall [Mennonites, Anabaptists and the Radical . gave me a sense of unity. I’m not the only Ben Herr by the sea in one who’s interested in our past. There are Sicily. (Drew Beitzel) “The study of Anabaptist origins was really beneficial to me, but the application of those beliefs into life today is more important. I found myself reminded of this many times on the trip.” Brotherhood Beacon • June 2012 7 RBC Feature CONT. Twila Slaubaugh on our first day in Paris. Reformation] focused part of the trip, I was having a Twila Slaubaugh, 19 (Mylo, really difficult time putting myself back in time and pic- N.D.): Twila was excited about turing things as they were during the time we studied – being able to see the paintings because I’m pretty sure there weren’t hand bag stores in she’d studied “in person . the first floor of all the houses early Anabaptists met and actually seeing them, how they lived in. The modernity of the cities/towns was really [the artists] painted, . the dif- throwing me off as I tried to understand the setting and ferent styles!” context of early Anabaptist leaders. Visiting the concentra- Then it sank in that maybe this was actually how tion camp site at Dachau, things should be. After all, we live in a modern world and Germany made a deep are trying to live out an Anabaptist faith (whatever degree impression on her. “Just of liberal or conservative it may be). So yes, seeing the thinking of what they went influence of modernity on old architecture and locations through, and we were there, where it actually happened. makes sense; today’s society and culture is influencing us Horrible things. Just being there made you realize as well. The study of Anabaptist origins was really ben- this actually happened.” She was moved by the stories eficial to me, but the application of those beliefs into life she read and heard at the museum, and amazed that some today is more important. I found myself reminded of this people had actually survived. many times on the trip. The display of artifacts taken from the prisoners also Stephanie Moore, 20 made an impression on her. She listed some of the items on (Hazard, Kentucky): The study display: “photos of boyfriends, girlfriends . these were tour proved to be one of the real, normal people who had family and friends.” best learning experiences I've Jake Huber, 21 (Au Gres, Mich.): Jake said the RBC had so far. The first three European study tour has helped him “realize the vast- weeks of intense studying ness and diversity in the world I live in.” The tour also were fueled with the excite- reinforced the fact that God is present everywhere, in all ment of soon going to see cultures. “He remains the same God, crossing over all what I was reading about. cultural and geographical barriers. As big as the world in The next three weeks in which we live is, God is bigger still. Europe reinforced every- “As our study group lived and traveled about Europe I thing I had learned back had ample opportunity to meet and observe people from a at Rosedale. I could wide array of ethnic and cultural backgrounds.” As he sat point out the flying but- on the underground subways, walked along the cobbled tresses on Gothic cathedrals streets, or toured museums and cathedrals, he wondered and I knew the story behind the about the people around him.