Each morning, when Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) volunteers head out to job sites in Monte Lake, B.C., Helmut Hein of Abbotsford, B.C. feels a pang. “I always wish I could be going with them,” said the long-time MDS volunteer, now serving as a...
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Dustan Eager was home alone when the knock on the door came at 2 a.m. It was August 4, 2021 and someone from emergency services was there, telling him to get ready to leave his home in Monte Lake, B.C. because of the encroaching fire. His wife, Tammy...
A Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) work site is often a beehive of activity. You wouldn’t normally think of it as a place to practice contemplation. But that’s not how it was viewed by John and Kim Alexis. The couple are part of Imago Dei Church...
They call themselves the “three amigas”—Spanish for “friends.” The three—Betty Ramones, 31, Lindsay Hofer, 20 and Shannon Lang, 27—are longer-term Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) Canada volunteers in Monte Lake, B.C. All three are in...
For Sam Perera of Princeton, B.C., it was a case of really bad timing. Perera, originally from Vancouver, bought a riverside house in that southeastern B.C. town in October 2021—a place he could afford in a community he intended to call his new...
For some youth at The Meeting Place, a Mennonite Brethren church in Winnipeg, 2020 was going to be a big year—they were going to do a spring overseas service trip. But then the pandemic hit. “We had done a lot of fundraising and planning, but...
“No preaching!” That’s the first thing Danie Brooks told Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) volunteer James Toews when he showed up at his home outside Princeton, B.C. one morning to begin work. “I wanted to be honest with him right away, this...
Families looking to spend some time together and do some service for others can do both this summer in Princeton, B.C. through the Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) Canada Family Program. Through the Program, families will do landscaping and build...
With all the attention on the severe flooding that hit B.C. in November 2021, it’s easy to forget about those who lost their homes to last summer’s wildfires in that province. But Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) Canada hasn’t forgotten. In...
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