title
PROPOSED RESOLUTION
HONORING THE LIFE AND CONTRIBUTIONS OF HILDA CARPER
WHEREAS, visionary and life-long Mennonite member, Hilda Carper, died on December 22, 2021 surrounded by loved ones at the age of 94; and
WHEREAS, Hilda was born on March 4, 1927 in an unheated bedroom of an old farmhouse in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. She was the third of four children, Ruth, Jimmy, Hilda, and Jean. They lived in an isolated farmhouse that did not have running water or electricity until she was seven. Her mother was a schoolteacher in addition to being a housewife and mother. Her father grew up on a Mennonite farm and never went past 8th grade in school. When she was 12, Hilda moved with her family to a Mennonite community in southeastern Virginia; and
WHEREAS, Hilda attended Eastern Mennonite University for a year before stopping to teach at the parochial school started by her mother for their home church. She returned to Goshen College where she graduated in 1950. From 1953-1957, she lived in Basel, Switzerland. There she wrote Bible lessons for children that were translated into German and French, for use in Mennonite and other European free churches. There were three women on staff who became lifelong friends. They lived together with other Mennonite Central Committee workers as a household; and
WHEREAS, when she returned to the United States, she was invited by John Miller and his wife Louise, to join their fledgling community in Evanston, Illinois. She, John, and Louise had been part of a "dreamers' group" in Basel that would gather to talk about how to reform the Mennonite Church via intentional community. She joined them in 1959 at the newly created Reba Place Fellowship in Evanston, an Intentional Christian community of members who live and work together, freely sharing life and resources with one another, and with their neighbors to demonstrate God's peace and justice in the world; and
WHEREAS, Hilda first worked at Church of Hope on Peoria Street i...
Click here for full text