Mennonites In America

Explores the moral dilemmas faced by various religious sects and how these groups struggled to come to terms with the effects of wartime Americanization-- without sacrificing their religious beliefs and values.

American Mennonites and Protestant Movements describes the key religious values in a major Mennonite settlement over a period of three centuries in its encounter with other religious movements: Pietism, revivalism, Fundamentalism, and institutionalization. The author analyzes how Mennonites both resisted these influences and were changed by them. The book also documents the codification of practice in the twentieth century and how restrictions waned as a growing emphasis on peace and service emerged. The author demonstrates that the key values shaping the Mennonite community are religious, not simply ethnic, and are consistent with their sixteenth-century character. These conclusions are based on a careful study of their value patterns, nonverbal behavior, issues and personalities in confrontation, and in the conduct of their community behavior. This book will help a new generation of Mennonites who wish to discover their heritage and spiritual identity. For Christian believers outside the Anabaptist tradition it will clarify long-standing ambiguities about the Mennonites.

The Mennonite Experience in America Series weaves together the histories of all Mennonite and Amish groups in the United States. It offers something new in Mennonite and Amish history: an attempt to tell not only the inside story but also how one religious people, or set of peoples, has lived and developed along with the pluralism of the nation. This volume provides a rich interpretive story of how Mennonites have preserved their identity through the 20th century. Paul Toews examines ways progressive Mennonites have slowed their absorption into American culture through creating institutional systems, refining and rearticulating ideologies, building ecumenical alliances, and developing a service and missional activism. Meanwhile, the Amish have formed a creative set of adaptive strategies that permit economic integration and social isolation. An in-depth look at how Mennonites and Amish were able to become a more visible and respected people than ever before during their more than 300 years in America.,Volume 4.

Although the story of the religious life of the Mennonites may be told in few words, yet they have been the founders of the first German colony in America and have been among the pioneers in many of the frontier settlements in the westward expansion of the American people. And for this reason their history is of interest also to the student of general American history. I have attempted therefore to trace in this volume not only the history of the Mennonite church but also the complete life story of the Mennonite people, and have treated such phases of the subject as I could find material for. I have attempted further to cover the entire field of American Mennonite history and have tried to place every event of importance in its proper perspective. So far as possible I have tried to be impartial toward the various branches of the church and have given each the amount of space which according to my judgment is importance deserved. --from the Introduction

In the postwar era, Mennonites were no longer "the quiet in the land"; they began to articulate publicly their concerns about such issues as the draft, the civil rights movement, and the Vietnam War.".