91短视频

Hannah Mack-Boll, a 2017 graduate of 91短视频, from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, took second place in the 2017 C administered by Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) U.S.

Mack-Boll’s speech was titled 鈥淲hat is Your Intention?鈥� [Listen to an excerpt of her speech or read it here.] The speech includes experiences in (STAR) training, as well as listening to survivors of war-related violence in Colombia and that of the 91短视频 community when confronted with sexual violence.

“What do we do when we encounter systems that don’t trust us?” she asks.

Mack-Boll, a major at the time, advanced to the national competition after winning the contest in the spring 2017 semester. She received $225 in cash and a $200 scholarship to a peace-related conference or seminar of her choice. Her home congregation is Community Mennonite Church of Lancaster.

Jacob Miller, a recent graduate of Bethel College, North Newton, Kansas, won the contest. He was a communications and literary studies major at Bethel at the time of the contest, and now is a graduate student in communications at Kansas State University.

Miller鈥檚 speech, 鈥淢ennonite鈥檚 [sic] Protest of the U.S. National Anthem Lacks Inclusivity of the Black Community: A Call to 鈥楲ift Every Voice and Sing鈥欌�� prompts Mennonites to include race in discussions of peace. He also encouraged Mennonites to recognize the violence inherent in nationalist songs, such as 鈥淭丑别 Star Spangled Banner.鈥�

鈥淥n September 1, 2016 San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (who is now a free agent) took the knee heard 鈥檙ound the world to bring light to social injustices facing Black Americans in contemporary times,鈥� Miller wrote in his speech.

In his speech, he says that although some Mennonite educational institutions do not perform the national anthem before sporting events, they鈥檙e missing the connection with race.

鈥淩arely is Mennonites鈥� opposition to the anthem rooted in the continued violence of unequal systems that disenfranchise the black community,鈥� says Miller.

鈥淭丑别 why behind the protest matters,鈥� he says. 鈥淪o, today we must first, look to how Mennonites decrying the anthem generally glosses over the black community鈥檚 history of oppression, and second, reintroduce the official black national anthem that Mennonite institutions should play,鈥� he adds. The anthem he refers to is 鈥淟ift Every Voice and Sing,鈥� which is hymn number 579 in Hymnal: A Worship Book.

鈥淢atthew 5:9 says 鈥楤lessed are the peacemakers,鈥� but activism without inclusion is not peace; it鈥檚 injustice.鈥�

Miller, from Westmoreland, Kansas, received a cash prize of $500 and a $300 scholarship. He came in third in the 2015 contest for his speech, 鈥淔or the Sake of Peace, Please Remember that Not All Terrorists are Muslim.鈥�

Canadian Mennonite University student Marnie Klassen, from Abbotsford, B.C., came in third with a speech entitled, 鈥淔iltering Dispositions: Water Pollution in Canada.鈥�

The C. Henry Smith Peace Oratorical Contest is open to all students of Mennonite and Brethren in Christ colleges in Canada and the U.S. To be considered in this year鈥檚 contest, speeches must have applied a peace theme to contemporary concerns.

Directors of the C. Henry Smith Trust established the contest in 1974 in honor of the late C. Henry Smith, a Mennonite historian and professor at Goshen (Ind.) College and Bluffton (Ohio) College (now Bluffton University). Participating colleges host individual campus contests, usually during the spring semester of the academic year. Then the judges choose the top three speeches from the winners of each campus contest.

This year, three judges 鈥� Titus Peachey, former MCC U.S. peace coordinator, Lancaster, Pennsylvania; Janna Hunter-Bowman, assistant professor of peace studies and Christian ethics at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, Elkhart, Indiana; and Paul Heidebrecht, director of the Kindred Credit Union Centre for Peace Advancement at Conrad Grebel University College, Waterloo, Ontario 鈥� chose the winners.