The purpose of a prairie Bible School was to equip preachers, lay leaders and teachers to disciple the church members. That is to undertake the journey to Understand the old, old stories and what it means for today’s life.
To celebrate 80th anniversary of the Countess Bible School, a special memoir is being published as a pastor seeks to understand his own and his family’s journey in things spiritual and mental health:
Soul Ripples
Written by Tyler Ragan, Psy. D
Bookstand Publishing, 2019
There were simple values passed down through the generations of the Ragan family. Basically, it was being neighbourly, whether it came from a religious or non-religious point of view. Throughout the generations’ decisions were made whether to suppress the bad, deal with it, or embrace love and the good. It was the stories shared, some hidden, and when unburied brought healing.
It was in this life that the formal Christian Formation of Ty Ragan happened at his godparents’ church, Centennial Presbyterian, through their Vacation Bible School. These summers accentuated the already ingrained formation of loving your neighbour as yourself.
Ty, spent a lifetime attempting to answer the question, as many formed in social gospel framework, “Who is my neighbour?” through journalism, teaching, church ministry, addictions work, outreaching to those being trafficked sexually, rough campers, those in homeless shelters, dementia wards, youth correction centres, affordable housing and everything in between. It was answering the question of who the neighbour is, and how to love them that drove his life’s vocation.
Until May 2014 innocuous hand tremor led him to a doctor who told him to drink more water. By 2016 mysterious micro-strokes and seizures would occur. On his 39th birthday in 2017 a reign of mental destruction of high double-digit mystery seizures, failing memory, tremoring body and mystery vomiting would take him out of his vocation in October 2017, as he would simply weep “I can’t”.
The journey would lead him to centre on a new question, the first part of the second love command, love yourself or more directly:
Where does the helper go when they need help?
Soul Ripples is his family’s story of laughter, love, tears, pain, loss, addiction, mental health, violence, community, friends, grieving and the steps towards healing. Learn a new way of experiencing life. That’s right, the faithful servant discovering what it means to experience life with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and the living into the Wilderness to find healing. It is a story for not only individuals but churches that shows we are not alone, we are not independent, we are truly an interdependent people. Created by the Holy on the 6th day poetically, called blessed and Very Good. Discover the Soul Ripples.
Today is the first Sunday of Lent. A time of journeying in the wilderness, diving deeper to discover who you truly are in community. In Countess, AB we have always had a strong sense of community, helping out our neighbour, and learning as we go.
This October 2019 to March 2020 will mark the 80th Anniversary of the Countess Bible School. Bible School’s were designed to equip church members, itinerant pastors/teachers/preachers on their faith and spiritual development. It is unique that such a thing existed, and we intend to honour this idea with a 21st Century upgrade.
Soul Ripples
Is the journey inward of discovery on the way to healing. It is a story that spans generations of a family in exploring how mental health, and personal choices to heal have shaped each generation. It is about how one experiences the world, in that experience learns to understand that which we call soul. It is not a journey of being understood for the writer, rather, it is a journey to understand himself and his family and what it all means. It is a winding road through Canada, Alberta, involves Super Heroes, the CIA, outreach, church ministry, and answering the question, who is my neighbour? And how do I love them, as I love myself. Can I love myself.
More to come on release date, for this special learning opportunity of memoir for all those seeking to understand, and perhaps, love themselves just a little bit better and more.
There is the official history of the world, and the land. There is religious history. There is political history. There is geo-political history. Some would even class colonialism, and other epochs of history (Reformation, Enlightenment, and Romanticism). Each human movement and people cling to an official history of what they distil down to be the most important aspects for their legacy. The meta-narratives of history can be boiled down to the local communities’ yore, and then the tales of the people. This is the jurisdiction of family journals, scrap books, photo albums, and if one family is lucky, publishing of a memoir. This is the journey that Margaretha Wilms …and the Meadowlark Sang –Prairie Memoirs- (2011) takes the reader through. It starts with Mennonite Migration to North America, after laying out who Mennonites are, then comes down to her local family unit on the Prairies (when it was still the Northwest Territories).
Cronkinole board
A tale familiar to many of a family structure to accomplish shared goals, this being farm life, communal meals, shared religious upbringing, tight community with kith and kin. It also shares some of the struggles, what it was like to be in a world shaped by certain points of view. The fun of Crokinole (and yes it is fun, if you make it to Countess ask for a game). The importance of family, chosen and by blood, for that is what a healthy supportive community becomes, a family chosen. Sharing stories of roles that seem antiquated through today’s lens and child rearing that would not be considered but it was her reality that shaped her life.
The joy of Christmas and the arrival of the Eaton’s and Simpsons catalogue for ordering gifts from, and as we have learned through the exploration of the Countess Bible School, a time when the winter Sabbath from the farm would bring different opportunities.
Through it all, she ties to scripture of her heritage, Hebrew Bible prophets and wisdom. The familiar (to the Birds fans) refrain of the Teacher in Ecclesiastes 3:1-11 of a time for everything, and the prophet Joel, to a reminder of why sharing our stories matter:
Tell it to your children, and let your children tell it to their children, and their children to the next generation. (New International Version).
Willms (p.116) shares of the personal renaissance, as she grew in life and moved from shame to embracing of her heritage and who she was as a person. She writes of being a Saskatchewan farm child in the grasshopper infested-dust bowl of farm life of the Dirty Thirties, how her parents modeled values she still holds dear of the intangibles, or as Willms phrased it eternal over material.
Her journey takes her through Prairie Bible Institute and Caronport, as she discerns whom she is. The narrative shifts into the Russian Mennonites who came later to Canada. For Mennonites had enjoyed very good autonomy, and a strong control of the flourmill industry under Tsarist Russia, but between 1917 (Bolshevik Revolution) and 1925 (when the last would try to flee) the tide would turn as they were seen as enemies of the state (p.234-35). These immigrant’s to Canada became known as Russlanders, as only their country of origin was Russia (p.236).
CP Rail loved the work ethic of Mennonites that were coming in this later wave, and brought them to the prairies to work (Countess, Gem, Rosemary and Duchess) with each family being given ¼ sections of land originally managed by French Settlers (p.236). Willms’ husband, John was part of this wave of immigration. They were a hearty bunch that built a church in Gem fairly readily, with many choosing to gather in the Clemenceau School in Countess because it was closer in the cluster (p. 237). The influx of Russlander Mennonites doubled the size of Mennonites in Canada and brought 176 new congregations, this is important as the church was the hub of communal life (p.237). In 1924, 8,000 Mennonites came to Canada, and CP Rail negotiated to sponsor another 3, 772 in 1925 (p. 239). Some newcomers found Canada to worldly and wanted to go to Mexico or Paraguay to avoid what they viewed as a “sinful” nation; while others wanted to dive in to Canadian life taking further education, rising in leadership and building a new world (p.238-9).
Image from Margaret Wilms (2011) And the Meadowlark Sang Prairie Memoirs p. 241
John’s parents were part of the 1925 wave of immigrants from Russia. By 1926 Stalin had stopped the flow out of the Motherland (p.239). John was born to his parents in Ontario, they went on to settle a farm in Manitoba before finally coming to Countess, AB in an irrigation arrangement with a few other Mennonite settlers (p.240).
John Willms met his wife Margaretha, in Alberta, in the Irrigation District of Countess, part of what is known as the Palliser Triangle the driest patch of land in Canada (p. 241-242). John had remained in the area when his parents had returned to Manitoba.
The irrigation district from Calgary to Medicine Hat was the property of CP Rail, and built to facilitate the railway (p.242). It was tax exempt from 1921 and was to be irrigated but this idea was quashed instead to use a Dam system of the Bow River by Bassano (p.242). The French settlements were mostly in tact when the Russlander settlers came and moved in. They had originally been settled by Quebecois and Francophones from Eastern USA between 1917-1919 but after years of almost freezing to death, and few crops they left to head east back to Quebec (p.242). This is why CP Rail sought out the Russlanders to make the hamlets viable for their endeavour.
John attended Clemenceau School for his education, it was originally a Francophone school named after a VIP French General (p. 242-3). It was a one-room school house, with a rectory-style house on the same land for the teacher (who was also expected to function as janitor) (p.243).
As we move into the betrothment, wedding, and settlement back into Saskatchewan with Margaretha and John. Teaching around the province, children, staying connected with the family diaspora, the CCF, oh and a nice wrap up as an appendix with the recipes mentioned throughout the book.
It makes one reflect if they were to pause, and write the story of their family, what would it look like?
Apprenticeship is a brilliant design for most fields. It is the direct application of knowledge in real time. That is we learn, we serve. It is something that I have contemplated many times during my decades of service. There are some ministry or social work programs that build in practicum or service hours during each semester, which in my mind is brilliant. One can learn from a book and faculty sure, but there is something about seeing what works with the transfiguring or shadowed human before you. How do you facilitate the true self emerging? Other programs, wait until near the end to allow for practicum experience and I have found this can be a stumbling block for they are so filled with theory, and heady knowledge there is an unwillingness to learn from colleagues, elders in the field and those they serve for they are filled with knowledge and know it all best…but lack in the heart wisdom.
Most know of the apprentice models through the trades, which makes sense. How does one become a Master Tradesman in their field? Education and practice going hand in hand. Applied knowledge becoming wise. I write this reflecting on being the son of an Electrician. Trust me, I was part of the only SAIT class to need to write the tool exam, so I am not of the handy variety (at least my wife finds me cute, to invert Red Green wisdom). But in spite of my own inaccuracies there are some basics I learned along the way on job sites helping out, and doing paperwork. It aided in discerning where I was meant to be.
But what does this have to do with the Countess Country Museum or a Countess Bible School? It is amazing what happens when you peel an onion of lost prairie history. What we knew was that it was a CP Rail stop, a Hamlet built for that. What was discovered in its 104 year history was a story of discovery, migration, building, and connecting. Community across lines, where for a while, denominational distinctions did not matter. Where Buddhists and Mormons shared land, where Mennonites came and settled after French Settlers left (my hypothesis is the French farmer-ranchers left in the early 20th Century the Alberta area due to the Conscription Crisis that led to our first National Referendum in Canada).
The Mennonites settled the Royal Line, and from 1929-1940 met in Countess, AB out of Clemenceau (Francophone) School. In peeling the onion I discovered something intriguing about the land for 2019. It will be the 80th anniversary of the Countess Bible School (ran for 5 months in the winter of 1939-1940).
What is a Bible School?
T.D. Regehr in Mennonites in Canada 1939-1970: A People Transformed (1996) writes:
Bible schools typically offered a `Bible-centred, intensely practical, lay-oriented program of poste secondary theological training.’ (p.233).
There were 3 objectives:
Equip the laity with basic Biblical Knowledge and understanding.
Equip and train preachers, teachers, choir directors and other church workers.
Preserve a distinct Mennonite Identity
(Paraphrased from Regehr, p. 233).
Winter was obviously chosen, as on the Prairies it was the slow time, and also the darkest time. It supported not only learning but community for it connected neighbours. Truly it was the original Small Group in the modern world if you will. For the leaders learned and discovered their vocation while rooted in community practicing. It was spiritual apprenticeship, preparing those that served the intangibles of life and community. It was learning the knowledge during the Sabbath time of winter on the Prairies to apply in the new spring. Knowledge becomes wisdom when lived and applied. A life vocation is discovered through practice and community.
In 2019 we celebrate this scant 5 months of history on the prairies, as a place of discovery, learning, growth and wisdom. Much like what the Museum is, and will be for Alberta. Happy Anniversary Countess Bible School, 80 years on.
Reference:
Regehr, T.D.(1996) Mennonites in Canada 1939-1970 A People Transformed.
Thank you to Pastor Les, from Gem Mennonite Church for connecting us with Mary Berg who sent this excerpt in from a book of hers.
The following is information I, Mary Berg, Gem, AB, found int he Rosemary Mennonite Church History Book published in 1980. The information was written by Wilhelm (William, in English) Bueckert.
In the spring of 1929, the first Mennonite settlers came to the Countess, AB area. With the help of Mr. Jacob Gerbrandt, who was the Canadian Pacific Railway representative, they were able to purchase farms. Without exception, all these settlers had arrived from Russia during the years 1923 to 1924, and were searching for a place to settle. Since the C.P.R. had numerous farms and empty houses for sale in the Gem, Countess, Rosemary area, this was a good opportunity to purchase individual farms. These settlers, from various Mennonite backgrounds, also had the desire for spiritual fellowship and growth.
As means of transportation were working horses and boxwagons, or walking, long distances could not be travelled and gatherings were commenced in the Clemenceau School (SD No.63) on Sundays. This was a two-room school and provided the necessary space required. The school board consisted of Mennonite men. The teacher was also a Mennonite, Henry Paetkau, who taught here for fourteen years, moving to Ontario in 1943.
In the beginning, there were approximately six or seven families, later, as many as thirty-five. The majority of settlers were from the Mennonite Conference and Mennonite Brethren Churches, so turns were taken on chairing and leading worship services. Since there were no ministers living in the district until 1938, the ministers from Rosemary came to serve, as well as other visiting ministers from the Mennonite Brethren Church.
There were regular Sunday School classes and worship services as well as a choir organized by Henry Paetkau. In addition, there was a “Youth Club”, annual Bible Discussions, annual Thanksgiving services, Sunday School Conferences and “Songfests”. During the winger of 1939-40, a five-month Bible school was held in the home of the Peter Wiebes, one mile east of the school. The teachers were Leonard Adrian and Henry Neufeld.
There were also occasional visits from missionaries from both the Mennonite Conference Church and Mennonite Brethren Church.
The Mennonite Conference settlers became members of the “Westheimer Mennonite Church of Rosemary” which was organized on Feb. 6, 1930, and the Mennonite Brethren Church in Gem which had its beginning on June 2, 1929. Communion and Baptisms were held together with the Rosemary members of the Gem members.
In the 1940’s many settlers moved away and as transportation facilities improved, distance was no longer a problem. In 1946 the Mennonite Conference group decided to join the Rosemary Church for its fellowship and the Mennonite Brethren group decided to join the Gem MB Church. This then was the end of the Mennonite church services held in Countess.
We look forward to many more correspondents sharing the history of the area.
Soul Ripples 
Countess Chronicle 