AMISH & MENNONITES: INTERMARRIAGE = STRANGE THINGS
J. Grant Swank, Jr.
In a Mennonite community near our Canadian home, there is much that is strange.
As I drive through those rural scenes, taking in God’s lush beauty and the large farms spread over acres and acres, I note humans in fields. Some of those humans stop, look up at my passing van, and stare. Some of those humans look imbecilic. I’m not being mean. I’m just relating what I see.
When I get up close to some of those humans, I note that they look at me oddly. I am looked upon as an alien. To me they appear odd. Their facial expressions don’t seem to be normal. Their demeanor is off-center. They peer at me as if they had just come upon the man in the moon. I look back as if I am studying an out of the ordinary creature.
Being a Christian, I do not give away that I appear to be trying to analyze these people. But I can’t help but notice.
I know they go to the church in the middle of their Mennonite community. I know they have elders overseeing this and that religious. I know they believe in God. I know their children attend the community school, up until a few grades and then they are dismissed to work on the farms and help with housework.
I also know that most of these humans don’t use deodorant. Most of the women never shave their legs or armpits. That does not make them evil. I’m just relating some factual details about this particular community.
When one of their number was employed by a relative of mine, he had to ask her to use deodorant because his family and the public worked alongside this Mennonite young woman. My relative’s wife even went to the store to buy the new employee deodorant for she had no idea what to purchase.
I also know that when some of the Mennonite men in the rural community came to do some carpentry work in my relative’s home, the body odor was so severe that my relative had to ask the workers to take baths and put deodorant on before coming into his house. It was not that my relative was being discourteous for he is a most mannerly Christian. It’s just that what he requested had to be.
I’ve visited these Mennonites, most of the time buying summer vegetables from their food stands and humble outlets alongside their homes and barns.
I’d drive down the dusty roads to one house or another, meandering the lane and then come upon a sale or two or three. Usually there was one particularly gracious woman who tended to the stand. She looked what I would define as “normal’ and talked with a homespun graciousness. But there were others nearby who did not appear normal and were not able to converse that well with me, a customer.
Now I have other Mennonite friends in New York State. They are in another league than the ones in the Canadian community. They don’t appear strange, they use deodorant, they oversee prosperous businesses and are a welcomed segment of the community. They intermingle with non-Mennonites as easily as they fellowship with their own kind. As far as theology is concerned, they would fit into the Protestant evangelical genre.
Yes, the women wear their prayer caps. And they don’t wear make-up. But other than that, they blend in with the typical country folk with whom they live in community.
Therefore, I know that there are Mennonites and then there are Mennonites.
Not all Mennonites are the same nor live the same lifestyle. Some are quite religiously legalistic and actually don’t know that much about what evangelicals would call “biblical theology.” They know more about the laws set forth by the elders than they do about the biblical information. These are quite different than the truly evangelical Mennonites.
Then of course there are some differences even within the Mennonite evangelical category. Some allow musical instruments and public address systems as well as back-up music via cassettes for group singing.
The more traditional have nothing to do with instrumental music or present-day amplification systems in the sanctuary. And between the two groups, there can be much debate within families and church memberships.
All this came to mind when reviewing 60 Minutes’ presentation, “Amish Plagued by Genetic Disorders” as reported by Vicki Mabrey.
She focused in on illnesses within the Amish community, many times such unfortunate situations hidden from the public. Yet the documentary delved into the facts and what was surfaced is very similar to what I believe can also be found in some of the isolated, intermarrying Mennonite communities worldwide.
The nub of the problem is intermarriage — both for Amish and for Mennonites. Intermarriage can yield some very sick humans and devastating existences.
Yet Amish are so exclusive in their differences from non-Amish that they gravitate toward one another for marriage. The same with the more isolated Mennonite mindsets. It’s marrying within one’s own community or suffering in the soul. It can come down to just that.
Vicki Mabrey reports: “It doesn’t get much more peaceful than the simple life among the Amish in rural Ohio. They have no cars, no electricity, no televisions. But their children have medical conditions so rare, doctors don’t have names for them yet.
“The Amish make up only about 10 percent of the population in Geagua County in Ohio, but they’re half of the special needs cases. Three of the five Miller children, for example, have a mysterious crippling disease that has no name and no known cure.
“Their father, Bob Miller, says he realizes there is a crisis in the community, which is why he and two other fathers, Irwin Kuhns and Robert Hershberger, have agreed to break a strict Amish rule that forbids them to appear on camera. The three sat for an informal interview.
“The three Byler sisters were all born with a condition that has no cure and mysteriously leads to severe mental retardation and a host of physical problems. Last year, doctors figured out the girls have the gene for something called Cohen Syndrome. Since then, more than a dozen other cases of Cohen’s have been discovered in Ohio Amish country.
“Over generations of intermarriage, rare genetic flaws have shown up, flaws which most of us carry within our genetic makeup but which don't show up unless we marry someone else with the same rare genetic markers.
“Iva Byler, mother of the three girls with Cohen Syndrome, made an even more drastic change eight years ago, after her third child in a row showed signs of this crippling disorder. The eldest, Betty Ann, is 24 and functions at a 9-month level. Irma is 21 and functions as a 5-year-old; Linda, at age 18, can’t even sit up.
“’I don't think the Amish really understand that it's a genetic disorder that causes the handicapping condition,’ Byler says. The Amish think it is God’s will; ‘Gottes Wille’ is how they describe it.
“Despite the illnesses in his family, Miller would not use such tests. ‘That's our-- our lifestyle is that way. We-- we trust God to take care of that, you know? We just, just the way we—we – live.’”
“Joyce Brubacker, who comes from the slightly less-orthodox Mennonite faith, says at minimum the Amish and Mennonites should be testing their children as soon as they’re born. That’s what saved her daughter Shayla’s life. After her first child, Monte, died of an unusual-sounding genetic condition called Maple Syrup Urine Disease, Joyce had Shayla tested, and she was positive.
“With Maple Syrup Urine Disease, the body turns protein into poison, causing brain damage. Shayla was immediately put on a strict low-protein diet. Now, she’s 20 years old and healthy. If she had not been tested, Shayla says, ‘I probably would have been in a coma or died at that point, or had brain swelling which would have took me very dramatic. I mean it would just--boom, boom, boom and I woulda been dead.’”
“Right now, the best prevention for many of these mutations is to prevent intermarriage, which is hard to do. Marrying outside the faith could create a healthier gene pool, but it would also ultimately destroy the very essence of what it means to be Amish.
“’I have a son that married a girl, they share the same great-great grandfather,’ says Iva Byler. ‘And when he called me to tell me that he was gonna get married, I said, “Do you realize that you already stand a big chance to have a handicapped child since you have three siblings.” And he says, “Yes, I know.” He got married anyway.’”
In a Mennonite community near our Canadian home, there is much that is strange.
As I drive through those rural scenes, taking in God’s lush beauty and the large farms spread over acres and acres, I note humans in fields. Some of those humans stop, look up at my passing van, and stare. Some of those humans look imbecilic. I’m not being mean. I’m just relating what I see.
When I get up close to some of those humans, I note that they look at me oddly. I am looked upon as an alien. To me they appear odd. Their facial expressions don’t seem to be normal. Their demeanor is off-center. They peer at me as if they had just come upon the man in the moon. I look back as if I am studying an out of the ordinary creature.
Being a Christian, I do not give away that I appear to be trying to analyze these people. But I can’t help but notice.
I know they go to the church in the middle of their Mennonite community. I know they have elders overseeing this and that religious. I know they believe in God. I know their children attend the community school, up until a few grades and then they are dismissed to work on the farms and help with housework.
I also know that most of these humans don’t use deodorant. Most of the women never shave their legs or armpits. That does not make them evil. I’m just relating some factual details about this particular community.
When one of their number was employed by a relative of mine, he had to ask her to use deodorant because his family and the public worked alongside this Mennonite young woman. My relative’s wife even went to the store to buy the new employee deodorant for she had no idea what to purchase.
I also know that when some of the Mennonite men in the rural community came to do some carpentry work in my relative’s home, the body odor was so severe that my relative had to ask the workers to take baths and put deodorant on before coming into his house. It was not that my relative was being discourteous for he is a most mannerly Christian. It’s just that what he requested had to be.
I’ve visited these Mennonites, most of the time buying summer vegetables from their food stands and humble outlets alongside their homes and barns.
I’d drive down the dusty roads to one house or another, meandering the lane and then come upon a sale or two or three. Usually there was one particularly gracious woman who tended to the stand. She looked what I would define as “normal’ and talked with a homespun graciousness. But there were others nearby who did not appear normal and were not able to converse that well with me, a customer.
Now I have other Mennonite friends in New York State. They are in another league than the ones in the Canadian community. They don’t appear strange, they use deodorant, they oversee prosperous businesses and are a welcomed segment of the community. They intermingle with non-Mennonites as easily as they fellowship with their own kind. As far as theology is concerned, they would fit into the Protestant evangelical genre.
Yes, the women wear their prayer caps. And they don’t wear make-up. But other than that, they blend in with the typical country folk with whom they live in community.
Therefore, I know that there are Mennonites and then there are Mennonites.
Not all Mennonites are the same nor live the same lifestyle. Some are quite religiously legalistic and actually don’t know that much about what evangelicals would call “biblical theology.” They know more about the laws set forth by the elders than they do about the biblical information. These are quite different than the truly evangelical Mennonites.
Then of course there are some differences even within the Mennonite evangelical category. Some allow musical instruments and public address systems as well as back-up music via cassettes for group singing.
The more traditional have nothing to do with instrumental music or present-day amplification systems in the sanctuary. And between the two groups, there can be much debate within families and church memberships.
All this came to mind when reviewing 60 Minutes’ presentation, “Amish Plagued by Genetic Disorders” as reported by Vicki Mabrey.
She focused in on illnesses within the Amish community, many times such unfortunate situations hidden from the public. Yet the documentary delved into the facts and what was surfaced is very similar to what I believe can also be found in some of the isolated, intermarrying Mennonite communities worldwide.
The nub of the problem is intermarriage — both for Amish and for Mennonites. Intermarriage can yield some very sick humans and devastating existences.
Yet Amish are so exclusive in their differences from non-Amish that they gravitate toward one another for marriage. The same with the more isolated Mennonite mindsets. It’s marrying within one’s own community or suffering in the soul. It can come down to just that.
Vicki Mabrey reports: “It doesn’t get much more peaceful than the simple life among the Amish in rural Ohio. They have no cars, no electricity, no televisions. But their children have medical conditions so rare, doctors don’t have names for them yet.
“The Amish make up only about 10 percent of the population in Geagua County in Ohio, but they’re half of the special needs cases. Three of the five Miller children, for example, have a mysterious crippling disease that has no name and no known cure.
“Their father, Bob Miller, says he realizes there is a crisis in the community, which is why he and two other fathers, Irwin Kuhns and Robert Hershberger, have agreed to break a strict Amish rule that forbids them to appear on camera. The three sat for an informal interview.
“The three Byler sisters were all born with a condition that has no cure and mysteriously leads to severe mental retardation and a host of physical problems. Last year, doctors figured out the girls have the gene for something called Cohen Syndrome. Since then, more than a dozen other cases of Cohen’s have been discovered in Ohio Amish country.
“Over generations of intermarriage, rare genetic flaws have shown up, flaws which most of us carry within our genetic makeup but which don't show up unless we marry someone else with the same rare genetic markers.
“Iva Byler, mother of the three girls with Cohen Syndrome, made an even more drastic change eight years ago, after her third child in a row showed signs of this crippling disorder. The eldest, Betty Ann, is 24 and functions at a 9-month level. Irma is 21 and functions as a 5-year-old; Linda, at age 18, can’t even sit up.
“’I don't think the Amish really understand that it's a genetic disorder that causes the handicapping condition,’ Byler says. The Amish think it is God’s will; ‘Gottes Wille’ is how they describe it.
“Despite the illnesses in his family, Miller would not use such tests. ‘That's our-- our lifestyle is that way. We-- we trust God to take care of that, you know? We just, just the way we—we – live.’”
“Joyce Brubacker, who comes from the slightly less-orthodox Mennonite faith, says at minimum the Amish and Mennonites should be testing their children as soon as they’re born. That’s what saved her daughter Shayla’s life. After her first child, Monte, died of an unusual-sounding genetic condition called Maple Syrup Urine Disease, Joyce had Shayla tested, and she was positive.
“With Maple Syrup Urine Disease, the body turns protein into poison, causing brain damage. Shayla was immediately put on a strict low-protein diet. Now, she’s 20 years old and healthy. If she had not been tested, Shayla says, ‘I probably would have been in a coma or died at that point, or had brain swelling which would have took me very dramatic. I mean it would just--boom, boom, boom and I woulda been dead.’”
“Right now, the best prevention for many of these mutations is to prevent intermarriage, which is hard to do. Marrying outside the faith could create a healthier gene pool, but it would also ultimately destroy the very essence of what it means to be Amish.
“’I have a son that married a girl, they share the same great-great grandfather,’ says Iva Byler. ‘And when he called me to tell me that he was gonna get married, I said, “Do you realize that you already stand a big chance to have a handicapped child since you have three siblings.” And he says, “Yes, I know.” He got married anyway.’”
