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Stephen Kriss

Leading Through an Impasse (Or in the Wilderness)

June 26, 2025 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

For my 40th birthday, I traveled with a group of students to hike Mount Sinai. At the time, Sinai was experiencing a series of kidnappings and a significant decrease in the number of tourists. It was the best time and a precarious time to go. 

Though our guides had assured us our safety, at one stop along the way they ushered us quickly back into the bus due to a suspicious looking approaching vehicle. Our small tourist bus was accompanied by armed guards in a separate vehicle. This was the only time I’ve traveled abroad with a group and second guessed my decision to go. 

Creative Commons (Wikipedia)

Our hotel, seemingly empty except for our group, was foreboding and it felt like something could go awry at any moment. We were among the first wave of returning tourists and may have been the only U.S. American group there. 

The hike to Mt. Sinai is often done to catch the sunrise. It’s a trek up the mountain alongside other pilgrims–most walking, and some on camels or horses. Even in these riskier circumstances, there was a rush of people. I managed to find a few meaningful moments there and the group enjoyed the memorable experience. Afterward, we spent a lovely few days at a seaside resort near the Israeli border that provided opportunity to swim in the Gulf of Elat. 

My experience of Sinai was better in retrospect. While the sunrise hike and the resort were highpoints, what I remember most is the doubt I felt about bringing a group there at that precarious time. 

Creative Commons (Wikipedia)

There are parallels here with the Biblical story. The children of Israel asked, “Has God taken us to this wilderness to die?” Wandering in the Sinai for 40 years before entering the promised land sounds excruciating.  

The liminal space of “not yet” is hard to endure, especially in a culture with instant gratification and same-day delivery. In times of stress, change, and turmoil, we often long for quick answers when we actually need time: time to process and to be formed together. 

Leading with Mosaic Mennonite Conference in this season has involved, for me, some second-guessing and a lot of questions. How did we get here? What is God’s intention for us?   

How did we get here? What is God’s intention for us?   

I declared a few weeks ago that I was done trying to understand systems, whether our government, our church systems, or the Steelers’ decision to hire Aaron Rodgers. Sometimes these processes don’t factor in our perspectives or experiences, especially those of us who don’t regularly have access to points of power and decision-making. 

The reality is that we are almost always living in liminal space. That dash on a tombstone that marks the span of our life is full of experiences of here, but not yet.  

So here we are, many of us leading and wandering in a kind of wilderness. It’s a space and time that doesn’t always make sense to us. We face systems and powers that often seem misaligned with what we need for full individual and communal flourishing. And yet, it is in this space that we are formed. We become more fully ourselves, more fully the people God intends for us to be. It is here we can learn to exhibit the fruit of the Spirit, which requires patience, pruning, and care to grow.  

We lead in the midst of this process, though the fruit hasn’t fully arrived in us either. We watch for the kind of leaders this moment requires – voices and postures that may be different than those needed in other seasons. We pay attention to the ways that God provides.   

We recognize what is enough for our daily bread. We resist the urge to hoard. We might complain, but we strive not to turn toward building idols—those easy, familiar, most likely ungodly answers that would make it all make sense.  

There are hard questions in front of us. There are not easy answers. There will be menacing encounters and beautiful sunrises along the way.  

The process of becoming God’s people and representing the reconciling love of Jesus in this time will be full of paradox–requiring strength, power, and humility.  

The way will emerge. The Way, The Truth and the Life is always in front of us, behind us, beside us and even within us. So, in these in-between times, how are we preparing to embody that Way—in our flesh, blood, heart, mind, soul, and strength—both individually and together? 


Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Conference.

Mosaic values two-way communication and encourages our constituents to respond with feedback, questions, or encouragement. To contact Stephen Kriss, please email skriss@mosaicmennonites.org  

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Stephen Kriss

Holy Week in America as Strangers and Aliens

April 17, 2025 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

“Are you a US citizen?” 

“Yes.” 

“Travel safe and have a good night.” 

On the highway between San Antonio and Harlingen, there’s a border checkpoint. I’ve driven through this checkpoint before and been stopped and checked thoroughly. This time I was asked a simple question and invited to keep it moving under the setting Texas sun. I had flown into San Antonio and driven to visit with two former South Central Mennonite Conference congregations near the border who are seeking membership in Mosaic. 

Since the beginning of the year, I have spent significant work time navigating the changing immigration landscape. This has included paying attention to the vulnerability of the hundreds of persons in Mosaic Conference congregations who are not yet citizens of the USA. They are from dozens of countries. They have a variety of visas and statuses. Our growth as a conference has largely been comprised of 1st and 2nd generation immigrants. With the rapid changes in immigration enforcement, sometimes menacing rhetoric, and traumatizing stories told by the media, recent immigrants are on high alert. 

According to recent research, one out of 18 members of evangelical churches in the U.S. are at risk or are household members of those at risk of deportation based on the current enforcement practices and policies. Many recent immigrants are Christian. The reality of shared faith binds us together in ways that should complicate our thinking as Jesus followers living in the U.S. 

The future of U.S. Christianity relies on the vibrant faith of recent immigrants who are establishing new churches, renovating older church facilities, and bringing authenticity and global-mindedness to our ongoing faith expression and practices. 

As Anabaptists, we have a sensitive history with migration. Our Conference readily traces our story to the migrations of German-speaking families to Philadelphia almost 400 years ago. While we could rely on the invitation of William Penn for our settling (at least sometimes), we didn’t have the permission of the Lenape who we settled alongside.   

We maintained for generations a set of distinct identities while the U.S. American experiment played out over the next centuries. Historic Mennonites are now a deeply embedded part of the American story, having reaped the benefits of citizenship and land holding, capitalism and mutuality for generations.   

My citizenship is both a privilege of birth and a responsibility. Privileges are not meant only for my individual good. I can easily pass through a checkpoint with my light skin, blue eyes, and graying hair. As a son of Appalachia and of Slovak immigrants, I recognize that while all our individual decisions can have consequences, our privileges do too. 

For those of us who proclaim the reconciling love of Jesus in a broken and beautiful world, in this holy week can join Jesus as he weeps over Jerusalem. We can find ourselves in the story of Jesus’ Passion, as the disciples earnest in their desire to see the kingdom come in the ways that would restore Israel’s greatness. We can see our own betrayal of Jesus embodied in Judas and in Peter. We can join again in faithful and disoriented weeping with the Marys and Salome. 

And we can prepare for the surprise and ultimate hope of resurrection that brings us true freedom. In duty, we join the women at the tomb with a sense of dread and responsibility. As we wait, we may find ourselves surprised and overcome in the ways the Spirit shows up.   

We speak of the possibility of what we know and have seen. We find others who come running with us (like Peter and John) to find out that resurrection power is still living among us as we face these days with eyes wide open. And we say these words again in the midst of fear and in the midst of hope for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all. 

Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Even in America. 


Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Conference.

Mosaic values two-way communication and encourages our constituents to respond with feedback, questions, or encouragement. To contact Stephen Kriss, please email skriss@mosaicmennonites.org.

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Easter, Holy Week, Stephen Kriss

500 Years of an Anabaptism that Continues to Emerge

January 16, 2025 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

For my 50th birthday, I traveled to Europe to explore my biological family heritage in Slovakia and my spiritual family history in Switzerland and Germany. I began in the Carpathian Mountains where my great-grandparents had lived, discovering family names in cemeteries and noticing the similarities between the landscape and that of the Alleghenies of Western Pennsylvania, where my family later settled. This journey deepened my sense of connection and left some unanswered questions about my familial story, especially about whether, amid a predominantly Catholic family, I might also have Ashkenazi Jewish roots. 

The second part of my trip was a three-day immersion in Anabaptist/Mennonite history with John L. Ruth (Salford [PA] congregation). We visited key locations in Zurich, explored an archive to see a letter written by Conrad Grebel, and traveled to Germany. I saw the family heritage locations for the Landis, Groff, and Alderfer clans who are part of our Mosaic settler families from colonial days. It was a privilege to travel with John, who is now in his 90s, and hear his stories and enthusiasm. 

Stephen Kriss and John L. Ruth in Germany. Photo by Stephen Kriss.

John, his friend Peter Schmid, and I hiked to one of the Anabaptist caves where early members of the movement gathered clandestinely. Peter is part of the movement to stir conversation and confession between Anabaptists and his community, the Swiss Reformed. More than the spiritual significance of the cave, I remember praying together, and Peter gently guiding John as we walked the precarious wooded trail on a rainy morning, possibly the last of John’s many pilgrimages to that spot. 

The Anabaptist plaque on the Limmat River in Zurich, Switzerland marks the spot where Felix Manz and other Anabaptists were drowned for their faith. Photo by Stephen Kriss.

As the 500th Anniversary of Anabaptism approaches next week, I am reflecting on that European pilgrimage trip. Anabaptism was opened to me as a child through a Mennonite church in a mining town in the Allegheny Mountains. I have remained Anabaptist not because of right theology but because of relationships centered in Jesus, in all their brokenness and beauty. 

My academic training teaches me to approach belief with humility and openness. I have come to hold my own Anabaptism both lightly and seriously. I acknowledge the beauty and brokenness that exists within the breadth of Christian traditions including our own. I also have experienced that of God in settings beyond the framework of the church. 

I recognize that after the heroism of the first generations of Anabaptists, the movement institutionalized, became biologically bound in some settings, and was captive to many of modernity’s traps. I acknowledge that our practiced humility is sometimes the flip side of our arrogance. 

This year, as we honor Anabaptism’s beginnings, I am aware that some of us who have been Mennonite all our lives still wonder if it’s our story or how we belong in it. It can be hard to live within and alongside the margins of a 500-year legacy. Sometimes Anabaptism’s exacting and perfecting process can create implicit and explicit boundaries that are difficult to navigate as we seek to faithfully follow Jesus. 

Yet I’ve come to know that Anabaptism is always a plurality. It’s localized, contextualized, and personalized. It’s quirky and brave. At its best, it is both deeply personal and fully communal. It’s a balance of the Bible, the people, and the Spirit (though the work of the Spirit has sometimes not been considered enough).  

In this time which historian Phyllis Tickle has called another great reformation in the church, Anabaptists have an opportunity to honestly and humbly examine our past and imagine our future. What confessions should we be ready to offer in the midst of our celebration? In what ways does active repentance alter our trajectory? How can we embody the reconciling love of Jesus and exhibit the fruit of the Spirit while interacting with our neighbors in a global and local age? 

We will need to again be brave, full of both conviction and humility, repenting from that which has distracted us from the centrality of Jesus. We will need to remain open to the Anabaptisms that continue to emerge, ready to be led by the Spirit into faithfulness and change, binding and loosing, giving and receiving, hoping and working, broken and beautiful. 

Kriss family relatives in a cemetery in Spišské Podhradie Slovakia. Photo by Stephen Kriss.

Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Conference.

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Anabaptist500, Stephen Kriss

Reflecting on Our Red, Yellow, Green: How Our Discerning Looks on Paper 

December 5, 2024 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

Out of a desire for a voting process that includes more discernment, Mosaic Mennonite Conference has moved to a three-fold green, yellow, red pattern for our gathered delegate sessions. The colors allow a more nuanced response and at times have made our voting process seemingly more complicated. We are still learning what it means to be community together and to allow space for the Spirit while working within our legal realities.  

At Assembly on November 2, the primary discernment that required a response was to move forward in receiving the recommendation of the Pathway Steering Team on affiliation with Mennonite Church USA (MC USA). The recommendation toward partnership advocates for a different kind of relationship with MC USA, one that is currently undefined. In the meantime, MC USA has also embarked on its own re-imagination process. 

At the November Mosaic Board meeting following Assembly, we tallied all the yellow, green, and red responses on the wall in the meeting room, so that we could see the spread of how congregations and Conference Related Ministries (CRMs) voted. With a vote of roughly 1/3 in each category of red, yellow, and green votes, there were some identifiable trends. 

Red votes were dominated by historic Franconia Conference congregations. They likely came from two different perspectives on our relationship with MC USA. Some of our congregations would like further distance, and others would like the status quo in relating to MC USA. About 1/3 of the red votes were abstentions, some of which were people who left the gathering before voting. There are some outliers in this category but if we’re looking at an overall message, we can make these broad considerations. Many of the red votes had elements of defining this discernment primarily around how queer-identifying persons are engaged in the life of the church. 

Green votes were at least half from congregations that are urban and/or BIPOC majority along with a strong representation of former Eastern District and Southeast Conference congregations. For many of these congregations, the relationship with Mosaic Conference has emerged as substantive and sustaining. Many of the green votes likely saw their concerns represented in the work of the Pathways Steering Team along with the leadership of the board. Their comments represented a willingness to trust the leadership’s discernment and to move forward with partnership. These votes may or may not be deeply shaped regarding issues on queer inclusion. 

The yellow votes were more of a mix of who we are as Mosaic. Their concerns included a need for more clarity about partnership and some comments about what a redefined relationship with MC USA might mean for queer-identifying persons. Some yellow voters have long-term relationships with other Mennonite communities or institutions and don’t want to lose those connections.  

Some congregations voted as a block. Some congregations had votes spread across three categories. CRMs showed up in all of the categories. Some comments included a lament of possible lost relationships in a changed status with MC USA. Others questioned the value of membership in Mosaic Conference based on the outcome of the process.   

In the table group feedback, there was an underscoring of the value of ongoing communication between Mosaic Conference leadership and congregations. Over the next year as we figure out what partnership with MC USA might mean, we have work not only with the denomination but also in listening deeply to the life of our congregations, ministries, and leaders. 

I am committed to this work together and to listening as best as we can to the diversity of perspectives that make up our Mosaic realities. To navigate these challenges together, we will need the Spirit’s wisdom and wildness. To quote one of our leaders who shared reflections with me after Assembly, “The Spirit is up to something; I want to be part of it.”   

The Spirit usually brings a mix of life and chaos. After Assembly, I was reminded how being Mosaic together is both holy and at times with some confusion (Acts 2 reminds us how the first time the Spirit descended, it was both of these). I also notice that for some of us there is a sense of loss, and for others, a sense of being found, seen, and heard. 

My hope is that the red, yellow, and green process is just one of the ways we recognize the diversity of our experiences and perspectives. And that we find many ways to listen and to honor our diversity, centered in the reconciling love of Jesus. To be Mosaic requires us all to bring open postures toward creative and life-giving chaos and how the Spirit is still descending among us in a broken and beautiful world. 


Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Mennonite Conference.

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Stephen Kriss

Where Do We Go From Here?

September 5, 2024 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

My last vote as a Franconia Conference delegate was to reconcile with Eastern District Conference in 2019. After years of process and negotiation, a 150-year-old schism was reconciled. It was joyous and hopeful. There were tears and senses of finally. It was the fruit of long processes, listening, and laboring. It included a carefully constructed formation document that was designed to bring as many of us between the two conferences into relationship as seemed possible at the time. While this was happening in fall 2019, we expected those in Southeast Conference that wanted to remain in fellowship with Mennonite Church USA (MC USA) to join us in fall 2020. 

No one could have predicted that our Eastern District/Franconia Conference reconciliation process would be impaled by a pandemic and months of social unrest, including protests related to George Floyd’s murder and an uprising at the U.S. Capitol during a presidential transition. Our increased social isolation and polarization came to the surface as anger and frustration.  While many U.S. cities were experiencing protest, we took on the new hopeful name Mosaic. We believed that a new identity was necessary to move forward and find our way together. 

There were already some challenging points in our formation document. The question of affiliation with MC USA was raised, but as both Eastern District and Franconia were members, the team deferred it. There was conversation about switching our basic belief document from the Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective from 1995 to the Seven Core Convictions of Mennonite World Conference. At the time, that would have put us outside the boundaries MC USA had formed. And there were already tensions around the inclusion of queer people, with some of us needing the Grace and Truth and Going to the Margins statements, and others seeing this as a time for revision. We took the most conservative route and held onto all the documents and positions already in play, deciding that a new organizational system didn’t need that challenge yet. 

After our historic, joyous vote to reconcile, we had two online annual assemblies due to Covid concerns. We didn’t meet face-to-face again until after a special delegate session of MC USA in summer 2022. Some of us came to the 2022 Mosaic assembly with heated concerns about its process and outcome, particularly related to the passing of the Repentance and Transformation Resolution. There was a mosaic of opinions and responses, with rumors of schism already. In response to issues around human sexuality, Mosaic lost five member congregations and delegates allowed an opt-out of MC USA, which another seven congregations took. We focused on hesed, extending loving-kindness. We tackled a two-year process of Pathways to help us find our way together. 

In teaching about Anabaptism, I’ve come to love Walter Klassen’s work Anabaptism: Neither Catholic nor Protestant. His later addition would be that we are “both/and.” We have much in common with the Protestant movement and its fracturing ways. We have much in common with the orders of Catholicism in their orientations to distinct practices. As someone shaped by Catholic background and education along with Mennonite education and practices, I’ve tried to find a way for us to live in the in-between of this reality. Martin Buber, a Jewish philosopher/theologian, calls it the “narrow ridge.” 

The narrow ridge is precarious. Finding a pathway that is solid enough for us all to move ahead together while admitting the precarious and difficult terrain takes wisdom, willingness, and work. Moving forward with a recommendation as bold and complicated as a redefined relationship with our denomination will require elements of hesed, and another word that we used to know well from German, gelassenheit or yieldedness. 

The Pathways Team’s recommendation will require something of us. It is easy to define relationships as “in/out” or “right/wrong.” Sometimes relationships change because of organic growth. And for many of us, change is difficult. 

The recommended shift to partnership rather than membership gives Mosaic the space that we need to navigate the narrow ridge. We will need to commit to working in ways that are collaborative more than hierarchal, local/global rather than national/colonial, and relational rather than institutional. This creates space for growth and allows us space to further discern our identity as Mosaic Mennonites in a world that desperately needs the reconciling love of Jesus. 

Of course there is irony in all of this. And pain. And all kinds of emotions. I trust the work of the Spirit to use this moment regardless of the outcomes. Through our history, we have been entrusted with a peaceable and often fracturing way of following Jesus. We are like the world around us, both broken and beautiful. We are full of hope and possibility and desperately in need of mercy and grace. 

Author’s Note: Our conference communities have been in flux of relationships for years. 

  • Franconia Conference joined the General Assembly of the Mennonite Church in the early 1970s. Before that it operated autonomously in collaboration with other conferences (though rarely until recently with Eastern District).
  • Eastern District joined a group of mostly Midwest congregations to form the General Conference Mennonite Church after the split from Franconia in 1847.
  • Southeast Conference formed from the amalgamation of congregations from a variety of Conferences in Florida and Georgia in 1967 which then broke apart as it joined LMC following a 2018 vote. Several congregations from California joined Franconia/Mosaic over the last decade after exiting Pacific Southwest Mennonite Conference.

Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Conference.

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Stephen Kriss

Cultivating Next Generation Leaders 

August 15, 2024 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

Within the first weeks in my role as executive minister of Franconia Conference, one of the predecessor communities of Mosaic Conference, then-moderator John Goshow (Blooming Glen [PA]) told me to begin to look for my successor. John told me that while I wouldn’t get to choose my successor that I should build a team in such a way that the successor would be nearby. He remarked that within Franconia Conference leadership was usually cultivated within. That had been true in my experience; every person in executive leadership roles had either worked in the Conference before or grown up within a Franconia congregation. 

I thought to myself, “This is how 300-year-old communities keep their legacy alive.” And I began the slow work of constructing a team that includes the diversity of who we are, expanding on that as our Conference has grown and changed to become Mosaic. This invitation gave me permission to seek out young leaders alongside experienced leaders. Currently we have a staff of nearly 25 persons with a mix of strengths, gifts, and backgrounds. I feel privileged to lead alongside them. 

The invitation to cultivate next generation leaders is what initially brought me to Franconia Conference. In 2005, the Conference recognized a need to support next generation leaders (then the millennial generation in their 20s). We listened together, visited colleges, developed initiatives, and laid the groundwork for what would become today’s Ambassadors program. The process opened the doors for next generation pastors and leaders across the Conference.  Never did I imagine that it would also mean I would be leading a community called Mosaic. 

This is some of the church’s most important discipleship work. I am always inspired by young leaders who chose to invest in the church. I value the sometimes-tough questions they ask.  The church both needs and can withstand rigorous questions and doubts. Jesus met Thomas’ doubts with an invitation to engage. My life has been changed by working alongside those millennials who have challenged and inspired me. 

We are now pivoting to the next generations: Gen Z and Gen Alpha. Some of the questions they face are entirely new, spurred on by technology and the interconnected nature of the world around us. Jesus continues to call leaders, sometimes those we don’t expect. 

Our shared work of creating a context where next generations can choose to follow Jesus and respond to the “call within the call” means taking postures of humility and care, alongside creating brave spaces where it’s safe enough to try and do, to sometimes succeed and sometimes fail.  

This summer I’ve had the privilege of working alongside Brendan Sagastume who was shared between Mosaic and his home congregation, Perkiomenville (PA), though the Ambassadors program which wrapped up last week on retreat in Tampa, FL. Brendan’s quiet and efficient steadiness helped me to become a better leader, learning how to listen well, to invite, and to respond.   

Cultivating next generation leaders is essential transformative work. Until the reign of God comes fully, in each generation we must navigate how to embody the reconciling love of Jesus in our broken and beautiful world by calling younger persons to serve and lead alongside of those of us who are more experienced. This is the work of discipleship. And the way is made together toward God’s future. 


Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Conference.

Filed Under: Articles, Blog Tagged With: Stephen Kriss

Resourcing Our Pastors and Leaders for Holistic Wellness

July 18, 2024 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

This spring a group of Mosaic pastors and leaders gathered to watch a session on the annual Barna Report at our conference offices. Barna does research on the Protestant world in the U.S. context. The most striking thing in this year’s report was the challenge of mental health for pastors. Pastoring has never been an easy calling. However, in recent years in the U.S., it has become even more precarious, with nearly one in five pastors reporting having suicidal thoughts. We are not immune to this in Mosaic. 

The pastoral calling can be isolating. It is lived within community; however, part of the call is to be set apart from the community. Pastors carry special burdens with their families and their physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual health. I’ve struggled with some of these areas myself, not finding easy rhythms when there is always work to be done. Though the work can be taxing, it is meaningful and with people I sincerely love. 

Everence initiatives through the Lilly Foundation have sought to provide places and pathways for pastors to maintain their own wellness, including grants and financial counseling programs.  This spring Everence helped Mosaic sponsor a day away for our pastors. It was notable to me how many pastors signed up for the 15-minute massage sessions offered. Our bodies are carrying both primary and secondary trauma. We also offered time for personal, intentional prayer for pastors, from a team of pray-ers. All these sessions filled too.  

Mosaic leaders from California, Florida, and Pennsylvania participated in a “Mosaic Leadership Day Away” in scenic Lambertville, NJ along the Delaware River.  

Our Conference maintains a special fund to assist pastors with counseling, spiritual direction, and other needed resources of support. It is well-used, and we have relied on extra funds we received during the pandemic to strengthen this resource. We have nearly 150 active credentialed persons who serve in a variety of contexts. Some have access to wellness resources more readily than others. We want to make sure that all our credentialed leaders can have the care they need. 

Our leadership ministers regularly check in with lead pastors. We have regular learning communities and support groups for specific pastoral contexts. Our goal is that every pastor has at least two places of support from Mosaic Conference:  a direct line of accountability and accompaniment, and a peer group for sharing and resourcing. This is a goal yet to be achieved. We hope all our pastors have a friendship beyond their family in which they can process and feel support, whether that is a formalized mentor, trusted friend, spiritual director, or counselor. 

Our pastors serve diverse needs and communities. In some congregations, the pastor is called upon to lead the community in ways that an executive director would lead a non-profit. In other settings, the pastor is akin to a social worker, responding to various needs and identifying access to resources. In some settings, pastors are community workers serving neighborhoods and small towns. In many congregations, pastors must serve in almost every kind of role, from janitorial to preaching. We have pastors who serve as chaplains and organizational leaders, with their own sets of needs and challenges. Many of our pastors are bi-vocational. 

In our community of nearly 8000 people, the unique calling of pastor is carried by about two percent of our constituency. We rely on the contributions of our congregations, individuals, foundations, and our investments to ensure resources are available to cultivate healthy leaders and vibrant communities. 

With the reality of the Barna report in mind, we continue to invest in caring for our credentialed congregational and emerging leaders. We ask congregations to continue to recognize the significant calling their pastors carry and allow time for sabbath and connection with family and friends, for retooling and learning. Congregations and communities thrive when pastors and leaders thrive. 

I pray our ongoing support can allow our credentialed leaders to live out their sense of calling, knowing that they are worthy of God’s love, surrounded by honest and real networks of care. 


Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Conference.

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Barna Report, Holistic Wellness, Stephen Kriss

Marking Our 4th Anniversary as Mosaic

June 13, 2024 by Cindy Angela

by Stephen Kriss

This Pentecost marked our 4th anniversary of becoming Mosaic Mennonite Conference. We took our name during the lockdown period of the COVID-19 pandemic, during a weekend of protests surrounding the murder of George Floyd. Pentecost 2020 was for many of us, during a tough time, a bright spot to celebrate a coming together. (If you need a reminder of our unveiling, here’s the video, which was filmed at Zion [Souderton, PA] and Centro de Albanza [South Philadelphia] while trying to social distance, at a time when many of us couldn’t get haircuts). 

This year we marked Pentecost by encouraging #MosaicTogether gatherings across our Conference which brought congregations together in a variety of ways. That same weekend, the Mosaic board met at Bethany Birches Camp in Vermont for equipping on discernment and decision making and affirmed the anchor/foundational statements of our Pathways strategic plan. Our previously scheduled Vermont board meeting had been cancelled during the pandemic time due to Vermont’s rigorous regulations on COVID. In a lot of ways, we are still catching up and adjusting to the newness and challenges of the timing of our beginning together. 

Since our birth in 2020, we have received congregations in Florida that now make up about 15% of our membership. We have had several congregations leave our conference after the special delegate session of Mennonite Church USA 2022 and had several congregations close. In the meantime, we’ve supported numerous new church planting initiatives in the United States, Mexico, England, and Colombia, and have had our first online-based communities emerge. We are in the midst of significant change around us and within us. 

I’ve been thinking about what holds mosaics together. It’s easy to see the brilliant, unique, and bright pieces, but harder to notice the quiet work of holding the pieces together. The work of cement and grouting is not particularly glamorous but essential. The task of our Mosaic Conference structure is to hold and situate each piece. We are a community of communities and ministries, not individuals. It takes work that is both individual and communal to hold us together. 

In becoming Mosaic, we had lofty dreams. We didn’t fully know what we would be living into together. We moved forward with hope, believing that our foundation in Christ, our commitment to community, and our willingness to work at reconciliation would give us plenty to do and the strength to do it. Early on we confessed in our vision statement that we work within a broken and beautiful world. That reality makes a mosaic possible. And difficult. 

Cynicism can come from unmet high expectations. Unfulfilled hope placed only in the human realm, not within the reign of God, can frustrate us. We can find ourselves constructing a tower of Babel rather than participating in the fullness of the Spirit’s Pentecost work. The culture around us needs for us to become fully Mosaic, embodying the reconciling love of Jesus, and will attempt to disassemble it.   

I continue to be aware of both our beauty and our precariousness. I am grateful for the ways that so many of us have invested time, prayer, work, and resources that help situate our Mosaic reality, to hold our beauty and brokenness together. Our faith grounds us. The Spirit gives us hope to live out our vision and mission. And love, both of God and each other, is what will hold our mosaic together through the bonds of peace (c.f. Ephesians 4:3). 


Stephen Kriss

Stephen Kriss is the Executive Minister of Mosaic Conference.

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Stephen Kriss

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