Canadian Mennonite Bible College: planning and opening

Canadian Mennonite Bible College opened in September 1947 in the basement of Winnipeg’s Bethel Mennonite Mission Church. Its origins lay in earlier Conference of Mennonites in Canada discussions, including a five-member exploratory committee chaired by J. J. Thiessen in 1941. Initial plans stalled when a suitable leader could not be secured. Renewed postwar interest led to the appointment of Arnold Regier and a Canadian teaching team. The chart’s 1941 date therefore marks a preparatory stage, rather than the opening of classes.

After two years in church facilities, the college moved to Wellington Crescent, then to a new Tuxedo campus in 1956. Recognition as a University of Manitoba teaching centre followed in 1964. These developments connected Mennonite theological education with wider academic opportunities. CMBC eventually joined Concord College and Menno Simons College in the federation that began operating as Canadian Mennonite University in September 2000, carrying its educational work into a new institutional partnership.