The Kennel-Charles Anabaptist Lecture

This program is supported in part by an endowed fund is to stimulate an interest in Mennonite-Anabaptist history among young people.

“When Life Isn’t Simple: Faith in a Complex World”

We often want life, faith, and ethics to be simple—clear lines between right and wrong, insiders and outsiders, faithful and unfaithful. But in reality, much of life is more complex than we expect.

Drawing from experiences in San Antonio working with immigration, community life, and pastoral care, this talk introduces the idea of “spectrums” as a way of compassionate discernment. Rather than flattening complex issues into rigid categories, we can learn to recognize where we are on a spectrum—and how to move toward greater love, clarity, and faithfulness.

The talk will also explore how attachment to God, as reflected in the Lord’s Prayer, provides the foundation for this kind of discernment. When we begin from a place of being securely loved, we are freed from the need to control or judge, and invited instead into a life of wisdom, humility, and shared humanity.

This framework offers a way of engaging difficult topics—such as immigration, belonging, and ethical decision-making—with both conviction and compassion.

Speaker 

Dr. John Garland is the pastor of San Antonio Mennonite Church in San Antonio, Texas. He has spent the past decade working at the intersection of faith, immigration, and community life, helping to cultivate networks of hospitality and care for asylum seekers in collaboration with interfaith partners across the city.

John approaches ministry from the conviction that “there is no action without prayer, and no prayer without action.” His work integrates spiritual formation, attachment theory, and community practice, with a particular focus on how prayer and shared life can become pathways to healing and belonging.

He holds a Doctor of Ministry from Truett Seminary at Baylor University, where his research explored the Psalms as a resource for developing secure attachment to God.