The Mennonite Connection

I love the ambiguities of life that keep us just enough off-balance that we can never quite sink into ennui along the journey. On my first retreat at Holy Cross Abbey in the early 1970’s, the Trappist guest master Father Stephen proudly showed me his digital watch, calling it an “experiment” for the “Cistercians of the Strict Observance.” Later, my friend Randy led me to his ashram where simplicity was a rule of life, but where the latest in audio recording equipment helped the guru spread his wisdom far and wide. And for many years, whose state-of-the art stereo tape duplication service helped “Celebration Rock” maintain and expand its modest national syndication? The Mennonites’. You know. The ones with the wide rimmed black hats and the buggies. OK; not quite. Because it turns out there are different kinds of Mennonites, just as there are different kinds of Presbyterians, Baptists, and Jews.

I met Ron Byler and Ken Weaver at one of the many Fort Lauderdale annual meetings of NABS-WACC (North American Broadcast Section of the World Association of Christian Communication). They were connected with Mennonite Media Services in Harrisonburg, Va., near (or on) the campus of Eastern Mennonite College. These obviously were not the more conservative Mennonites whom many folk can’t tell from their Amish cousins in the Anabaptist tradition. Their recording facility in Harrisonburg was (still is, probably) a gem. They produced a superb series of radio PSA’s called “Choice,” as well as others that I often used in my local Richmond programs and on “Celebration Rock.”

A standard feature of each NABS-WACC conference was called the Showcase, where radio and television producers (NABS members) shared excerpts of their programs. Some of the showcased programs were produced in cooperation with major broadcast networks or network affiliates in major markets. Other entries in the Showcase were more modestly produced, like my show. I vividly recall Ken Weaver saying to me one afternoon right after the Showcase, “Jeff, why are you hiding your light under a bushel?”

“Pardon?”

“Your radio program is so good, you should be promoting it way beyond the small number of stations that are carrying it!” He was genuinely enthusiastic about what he had heard, and, as a national producer of radio and TV programming, he couldn’t understand why I was so low key about extending the reach of CR. I explained my budgetary restrictions, the sponsoring presbytery’s limitations, and the fact that I was all there was to the staff. (I think I’ve noted here before that it was one thing to imagine, write, record, edit, and duplicate the program; it was another to type the labels, seal the mailers, and drive the armful of cardboard boxes to the post office.)

Ken introduced me to Ron Byler, and made a proposal. I would produce the master tape (according to their higher quality specs) and mail it to Harrisonburg. Their facility’s high speed duplication equipment would reproduce several copies at once, they’d package and mail the tapes, and receive them back after the stations had broadcast the show. They’d recycle the tapes a few times and then retire the used tape to my studio for non-broadcast purposes. Oh, there was a cost factor in this, but the Mennonite Media Services (MMS) facility made the whole process so affordable that the presbytery didn’t hesitate to buy into Ken and Ron’s proposal. (Presbytery’s moral and financial support for my work were never-failing.) 

The Mennonite connection helped the ministry of “Celebration Rock” in numerous ways. The program sounded better than ever, I was freed up for other creative opportunities, and syndication widened. MMS held me to a high standard, kept me to a deadline (pretty much…), and certainly added to an ecumenical spirit of cooperation among faith groups.

I have to admit that one thing that had surprised me about the original proposal wasn’t the idea that the Mennonites would work hand in hand with Presbyterians, but that they would have anything to do with rock music! That surprise evaporated the day they sent me a music cassette they had produced: it was a rap version of Jesus’ parables! Mennonite rap. God works in mysterious ways…