Have the Mennonites Outgrown Their Toleration? (1 of 2)

Je’dult met aundre

Part 1:  The Amish Sam Mullet Gang.

    Forgive the terrible pun, but two recent news items have given ethnic Anabapatists cause to consider the definitions and boundaries of the ethnic-religious cultures and how these cultures are seen by those looking in from the outside.

      Renegade Amish leader (now a cliché) Sam Mullet is being arraigned for potential hate crimes against fellow Amish.  His defense,  that this a matter internal to the Amish community.

    Meanwhile, a tax dispute between Mexico’s Manitoba Colony of Mennonites and local authorities are leaving ethnic Russländer Mennonites wondering if they are being targeted for exploitation.  Is Mexico really taking a page from Europe’s Medieval past to pass off its financial excesses onto the backs of “ethnic minority enclaves” or ghettos?

    In the first instance, Pennsylvania and the United States are wondering if the Amish have lost their ability to tolerate each other (mutual internal toleration).  In the second, is the Mexican majority losing its ability to tolerate minority cultures (external cultural toleration)? 

Southern Evangelicals and Interracial Marriage – Is Race the New Gay?

 ne Kjast

    Forget Same-Sex Marriage, it seems a lot of  Southern USA Evangelicals are still trying to grasp interracial marriage.  With world-wide trends towards marriage indicating that it is a social institution in general decline – no longer seen as essential for raising children or living in a committed relationship – potentially outmoded concepts of marriage might seemingly outlive marriage itself. 

    South Africa and the United States South, two of the world’s most racially controversial societies in the 20^th Century, are again generating racial headlines.  It seems that certain ghosts of the past still haunt feelings of trust and acceptance between racial groups in these two regions.

    Last December (2011), despite decades of civil rights movements and legislation against racial discrimination, the Gulnare Freewill Baptist Church in Kentucky voted 9 to 6 to bar interracial  couples from becoming members or being used in worship services.  After a week of bad press, the church did reverse itself, but the damage was done.

    Huffington Post writer Melanie Coffee sums it up by asking, “So between you and me, how do you really feel about interracial couples? Are you OK with it as long as: A) It's not one of your children? B) It's not in your church C) They're not gay or D) The couple's happy?” (Coffee, see below).

Vic Toews' Privacy Issue

Vic Toews in the Public Lens

ne Heemlijchkjeit

    Vic Toews, Stephen Harper’s Minister of Public Safety and Mennonite-heritage Canadian politician, has recently generated a bit of a public debate – one pertaining directly to the Postmodern experience in the control and manipulation of the digital universe.

    The controversy stems from three character trends of the Post-modern identity experience – the perceived lack of individual privacy, the increasing atmosphere of George Orwell’s Big Brother security that sees all, knows all and processes all, and the rapid, irrevocable, transmission of information – any and all information, no matter how sensitive, no matter how private, no matter how truthful.

    In a turn-of-events that many Canadians are interpreting as well deserved comeuppance, Canada’s own potential Big Brother found the personal details of his somewhat messy divorce broadcast across the country for all to maul through and judge.  

Mennonite and Jewish Leprechauns?

En Häselmenschkje

     Today is St Patrick’s Day – an international celebration for Irish immigrant and cultural communities around the world.  In true Irish fashion, they have opened this day of celebration and festivity to all of their friends and neighbours – everyone is ”Irish for a day.” 

    For many in the United States and Canada, St Patrick’s Day is an annual celebration of immigration and our continuing ties to our immigrant pasts – Irish, Ukrainian, Mennonite, Jewish or Latin American – everyone celebrates.

    While most of us will be headed out to parades and parties (perhaps even quietly slipping out to local pubs and bars to celebrate with friends), there are also numerous opportunities to celebrate our shared immigrant heritage a bit more soberly, culturally and historically before we start tipping back the “Sláinte.”

Mennonite Drug and Alcohol Abuse Prevention

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 20^th 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.