`A remarkable spirit'
Friends and family will gather to say farewell to longtime peace activist Sadie Mast
A few months ago, members of Joy Mennonite Church gathered outside a modest house in Spencer and sang a classic song of love, “Let Me Call You Sweetheart.”
Sadie Mast had reminded her fellow church members that she and her husband, Moses, were celebrating their 60th anniversary so the congregation gave the couple a special musical tribute.
“We had almost the whole church in her front yard singing by her window,” said Ralph Ediger.
Ediger and his wife, Becky, are among the Joy Mennonite Church members and others who will gather on Saturday for a memorial service for Sadie Mast.
She died on Aug. 23. She was 90.
The outdoor event will be at 10 a.m. at 4708 Outpost Drive, the Spencer home she shared with her beloved husband. The event, hosted by the church, will follow social distancing guidelines and other public health protocols in place due to the pandemic and it will be shown online.
Sadie Swartzentruber was born in 1930 in the Amish community of Kalona, Iowa. She met Moses Mast while working at a school Ontario, Canada. The two married in 1960 in Iowa but returned to Canada to serve with the Mennonite Volunteer service unit in Alberta.
The couple moved to Spencer after serving in
Canada and quickly became part of the local Mennonite community and social justice networks. The pair moved to Honduras for two years in the 1980s to serve in a camp of Salvadoran refugees. The couple served on the Joy Mennonite pastoral team from 1997 to 2007 and Sadie became part of many programs and committees associated with the groups including the Oklahoma Council of Churches, Pinwheels for Peace, the Oklahoma coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, the Oklahoma Mennonite Relief Sale and the Peace Factory.
Local attorney James Matthew Branum called Mast a “stalwart of our local peace and justice community.”
He said he worked with Mast a lot over the years and was a member of Joy Mennonite Church from 2002 to 2018 and served as the church's minister of peace and justice.
Aaron Baker, an active
member of Joy Mennonite, shared similar sentiments.
He said he met Mast when he joined the church in 2009 and soon began to describe himself as a “disciple of Sadie.”
Baker said his friend wouldn't have called herself an organizer, but she was. She influenced many people, including those who joined the church.
“By the time they left, on the very first visit, they had a job to do. She was that kind of leader and just an icon in the peace and justice movement in Oklahoma City,” Baker said.
`Always inspiring'
Several community leaders said they were inspired by Sadie Mast.
Nathaniel Batchelder, director of the Peace House, said both Sadie and Moses Mast made it their mission to help the most vulnerable people. “It's always inspiring to know people who model that kind of behavior,” Batchelder said.
One religious leader met the Masts through their shared interfaith work.
Rabbi Vered Harris, spiritual leader of Temple B'nai Israel, said Sadie and
her husband were among the first people she met when she began attending interfaith events in the Oklahoma City area after arriving in Oklahoma City to take her post at the temple.
“Earnest and interested, passionate and hopeful, Sadie was a calm presence and a reminder that coexistence and respect can connect people of all faiths or no faith, all ages and backgrounds,” Harris said. “She will be missed.”
The Rev. Robin Meyers, who retired as senior pastor of Mayflower Congregational ChurchUCC earlier this year, plans to speak at Saturday's memorial service.
He said he met Sadie Mast because he kept noticing her at many of the peace rallies and similar activities that he attended over the years.
“The more we saw each other, we realized that though we came from different faith traditions we both were waging peace because it's not something that you can simply hope for — it's something that must be waged. You have to personally figure out what you have to do to
make the world a better place,” Meyers said.
Meyers said Mast “was a remarkable spirit.”
“I just think the world would be a more peaceful, gentler place if there were more Sadie Masts in it,”
he said.
Sadie Mast is survived by her husband, Moses, sons Marcus and James, and grandsons Brett and Brent. In lieu of flowers, friends are invited to make memorial tax-deductible contributions to Christian Peacemaker Teams. To make online donations, go to www.cpt.org.
For more information about Sadie Mast and her memorial service, go to http://joymennonite.org.