be’sope
 |
| Courtesy thehealthage.com |
Addiction, drugs and alcohol in the
Anabaptist community have become much more visible since the documentary Devil’s Playground came out in
2002. There should be no surprise. Long known for presenting a public profile of
simplicity and sobriety, the tight Mennonite (and Amish) communities have long
sheltered a growing, if hidden, confrontation with drugs and alcohol.
The old Mennonite joke (which has also been
applied to other cultures) goes something like this:
Q: “Why don’t you ever invite a single Mennonite to go fishing?”A: “Because he will drink all of my beer.”Q: “Why do you always invite two Mennonites when you go fishing?”A: “That way neither of them will drink any of my beer.”
The joke goes to the heart of the matter –
Mennonite culture is just like any other – we like our beer (or wine) and we
like to experiment and explore. However,
in the 20th Century, alcohol, tobacco and drugs have become
increasingly taboo and unacceptable for church members. At the same time, the assimilation of
Mennonites into non-Mennonite culture had dramatically increased the amount of
alcohol consumption and drug use.
Somewhat problematically, much of this use is hidden or does not begin
until Mennonite youth leave their hometowns. Even within towns, it is
difficult to understand if there is a different impact in the ethnic Mennonite
community contrasted to the larger society.
We just blend in too well when we want to.
Yet, having grown up in an isolated
Mennonite community, relatively sheltered from drugs and alcohol, scenes from The Devil’s Playground were only all too
familiar – not that we had parties of underage Mennonites drinking, but rather,
often when Mennonite youth “party” with non-Mennonites, our lack of experience
with alcohol leads to binge drinking and often a relatively naïve and helpless
drunkenness. My first drink was what I actually
thought was a harmless Kool-Aid. I had no idea that I had just had my first
drink or that a Kool-Aid tends to be
a highly alcoholic punch blend of rather nasty toxicity. I mean, we used to drink Kool-Aid at Bible camp and DVBS, right? Not the same thing.
The lesson is not that we have these issues
or that those who experience them are sinning
or failing or bad persons but rather, that like sex ed, we probably need a more
pragmatic education in drugs and alcohol and how to handle or avoid them. The world is now too small for us to hide
from these issues, and as Steinbach, Man., recently determined, it can no
longer be kept outside of the community.
In my case, I had been fortunate to have
many friends outside of the local Mennonite community who were also strong
Christians but a lot more worldly wise – well, and my family was way too poor
for me to have access to anything with which I might get into trouble. But even with such friends and precautions,
alcohol was definitely readily available to others through similar friends and
even smuggled into school events (sometimes the problem with avoiding the
appearance of evil is that appearances are usually deceiving).
Alcohol abuse is not new to the Mennonite
experience. The diaries of life in 19th
Century Chortitza and Molotschna are replete with incidents regarding alcohol –
seemingly it was not a sin to drink per se, and drunkenness was very frowned
upon (not dissimilar to today) but the occasional binge drinking parties at
weddings and family gatherings were quite common and could, and often did, lead
to trouble. In his published diaries, Rev. J. D. Epp bemoaned the impact
alcohol was having on the youth of the colony and the fights that seemed common
when other-wise close, sober Mennonite neighbors became loosened with drink.
I am not sure that our own Mennonite education was the most
effective at discouraging drinking (our sobriety was probably as related to the
sheer distance between our community and the neighboring towns as to any educational
outreach). Yet, our Christian Lifestyles
teacher probably did get one thing right – the sin (or problem) with
drunkenness or addiction was that you were giving up control of your life and
your morality to an inanimate substance – the relationship between the terms alcoholic spirits and evil spirits was readily brought
forward.
Regardless, I was glad to see that the
Mennonites of Chihuahua Mexico have determined to be a bit more proactive.
Writing for Terra TV, Enrique Lomas reports the recent success efforts by the
Mexican state have met with attempting to curb increased alcohol use amongst
the Mennonites of Chihuahua before it becomes a problem. The Ministry of Social Development under
Edgar Aragon has been providing student education for Mennonite youth to serve
as addiction prevention counselors amongst the Mennonite community.
Concerned that Mennonite youth, whom he
realizes were once well sheltered by the high morality and strong religious
sense of the Colonies, have increasingly been introduced to alcohol by the
surrounding Meztizo culture, Aragon has begun training young Mennonites to
better understand and resist addiction, especially due to alcoholism.
Considering the growing problems with
addiction in the world-wide Russian Mennonite diaspora and in surrounding
communities, this sounds like a great pre-emptive program that might serve as
both a model and a warning that no ethnic group, no matter how religious or
isolated is immune to today’s social temptations.
Tim Wall: It's the typical "forbidden fruit" phenomenon. Studies demonstrate that families who drink alcoholic beverages for religious ceremonies, dining, moderate holiday cheer, have low rates of alchol abuse. In Winkler, MB. the liquor store is 7 miles away, and a survey showed the large majority of patrons were from Winkler, NOT Morden.
ReplyDeleteThis is fine anyway nice try guys keep on hard working, truly nice info drug and alcohol rehab Austin
ReplyDelete