This appliqued Pennsylvania Mennonite quilt from about 1900 is a Princess Feather Variation. It will be part of the exhibit “Inherited Quilts” which honors the long tradition of Mennonite women meeting regularly to make quilts for relief and service projects. It will be on display in the Goshen College Good Library Gallery from April 10 to July 12. An opening reception will be held in the Good Library on Sunday, April 7 from 3-5 p.m.

Exhibit: “Inherited Quilts”
Dates: Sunday, April 7 to Friday, July 12
Opening reception: Sunday, April 7 from 3-5 p.m.
Location: Goshen College’s Good Library Gallery
Cost: Free and open to the public
Sponsor: Goshen College’s Mennonite-Amish Museum Committee

The exhibit “Inherited Quilts” honors the long tradition of Mennonite women meeting regularly to make quilts for relief and service projects, and includes Mennonite and Amish antique quilts that have been passed down through generations. It will be on display in the Goshen College Good Library Gallery from April 7 to July 12. An opening reception will be held in the Good Library on Sunday, April 7 from 3-5 p.m.

The tradition began in 1916-17 with the organization of the Women’s Mission and Service Commission (WMSC), which gave a church organizational focus and sanction to women’s domestic folk arts, especially the making of quilts. In 2003, WMSC and its successor organizations morphed into Mennonite Women USA.

The exhibit features vintage and antique quilts, mostly Mennonite and Amish, that have been inherited by members of the group Mennonite Women who meet monthly at College Mennonite Church in Goshen to quilt and do other handwork for charitable causes. At their regular meetings on the first Thursday of every month, the women engage in many different activities and handcrafts, including crochet, embroidery, knotting comforters, recycling prescription bottles and postage stamps, making boxes out of greeting cards, and cutting and sewing school bags. But quilting, whether for the Michiana Mennonite Relief Sale or other charities, is still a dominant expressive form for the group.

“Most of the quilters in Mennonite Women learned their skill from a previous generation of mothers, grandmothers, aunts and neighbors,” said Ervin Beck, retired professor of English and exhibit organizer. “This exhibit documents that origin by displaying quilts – full-size, crib, doll – made by ancestors one, two or three generations earlier who taught and inspired today’s quilters. Some of the quilts are in pristine condition, some are used.  Some are stunning in design, others merely beautiful.

“All invoke deep feelings in their owners as they preserve memories of beloved friends and relatives and serve as visual documents of family history.”

The show will also display quilting accessories and templates and an antique Mennonite paint-decorated blanket chest from Madison Township.

The exhibit committee includes Joy Hess, Rebecca Sommers, Barbara Smucker and Ervin Beck, with Rebecca Haarer of Shipshewana consulting. The exhibit is sponsored by the college’s Mennonite-Amish Museum Committee.

The Good Library Gallery, located on the lower level of the Harold and Wilma Good Library on the campus of Goshen College, is open from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Monday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Friday, 1 to 5 p.m. on Saturday and 3 to 11 p.m. on Sunday. Hours vary during academic breaks, summer and holidays. For gallery hours, call (574) 535-7418.

-By Becca Kraybill

Afternoon Sabbatical

Goshen College Professor of History Steve Nolt will present an Afternoon Sabbatical lecture on “The Amish Way: Patient Faith in a Perilous World” on Tuesday, March 12 at 1 p.m. in the Goshen College Music Center’s Sauder Concert Hall. The program is free and open to the public.

Many people recognize the outward expressions of Amish life, such as the buggies and bonnets, but are less familiar with the faith that sustains these practices. Nolt will shed light on the spirituality – the religious heartbeat – of our Amish neighbors, and ask what their religious practices might say to the rest of us.

Nolt was a co-author of a book published by Jossey-Bass by the same title in 2010. It was the first book ever about Amish spirituality and practice, and offered a rare inside look at how Amish Christian beliefs and practices inform every aspect of Amish daily life.

And the Amish population is growing. According to a 2010 report, the number of Amish in North America has doubled since 1991 to 249,500 people. Indiana is home to 43,710 Amish residents. This is due to large families and the fact that nearly 85 percent of children raised in an Amish community choose to join the Amish church as adults.

In addition to teaching history, Nolt is an internationally-recognized expert on the Old Order Amish. He is the author or coauthor of nine other books, including The Amish Way: Patient Faith in a Perilous World (2010), Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy (2007), Mennonites, Amish and the American Civil War (2007) and A History of the Amish (2003).

Afternoon Sabbatical programs are usually on the second Tuesday of the month at 1 p.m. in Sauder Concert Hall. For more information on the Afternoon Sabbatical series call the Goshen College Welcome Center at (574) 535-7566.

Future programs in the 2012-13 Afternoon Sabbatical series include:

Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at noon in College Mennonite Church Fellowship Hall
International Luncheon: Turkey with Merle and Mary Hochstedler
Cost: $20. Call 574-535-7565 before March 30 to register ($5 late fee).

Tuesday, May 9, 2013
Spring Bus Trip to Indianapolis: Show House and State Museum
Cost $65. Register early as there is limited space for this trip. Call 574-535-7565 to register.

Saloma Miller Furlong, author of “Why I Left the Amish,” just published by Michigan State University Press, will give a reading and presentation titled, “Two Lives in One: Inside and Outside the Amish.” The presentation, sponsored by Goshen College’s English and History departments and the Mennonite Historical Society, will be on Tuesday, Oct. 4 at 7 p.m. in Goshen College’s Newcomer Center Room 19 and is free and open to the public.

Miller Furlong was born and raised in an Amish community in Geauga County, Ohio and is a 2007 graduate of Smith College. In her memoir, “Why I Left the Amish,” she recalls her experiences as a child growing up Amish and how, over time, she came to leave the Amish community. During her presentation, Miller Furlong will read from her memoir and engage in a question-and-answer session on her experiences. Copies of her book will be available for purchase and signing after the presentation.

Editors: For more information about this release, to arrange an interview or request a photo, contact Goshen College Acting News Bureau Coordinator Alysha Bergey Landis at (574) 535-7762 or alyshabl@goshen.edu.

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 Goshen College, established in 1894, is a residential Christian liberal arts college rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition. The college’s Christ-centered core values – passionate learning, global citizenship, compassionate peacemaking and servant-leadership – prepare students as leaders for the church and world. Recognized for its unique Study-Service Term program, Goshen has earned citations of excellence in Barron’s Best Buys in Education, “Colleges of Distinction,” “Making a Difference College Guide” and U.S. News & World Report‘s “America’s Best Colleges” edition, which named Goshen a “least debt college.” Visit www.goshen.edu.

• “Amish Grace” included on Publishers Weekly’s Best of 2007 list (one of 15 Religion titles).

Related links:

• Convocation speech transcript, “Why the Amish Forgave a Killer” by GC Professor Steve Nolt, Monday, Oct. 2, 2007.
• Press release: Amish forgiveness rang around the world, and continues a year later, Tuesday, October 2, 2007.
• Book website: www.AmishGrace.com
• Professor of English Ann Hostetler’s “Sonnets for the Amish Girls of Nickel Mines,” 2006.

In the media:

• Nolt op-ed: The Amish remind us all that forgiveness is possible. South Bend Tribune. Oct. 10, 2007.
• ‘Grace’ a popular read. The Truth. Oct. 6, 2007. (free registration required)
• On Amish Grace. Bill Moyers Journal. Oct. 5, 2007. (video, transcript, resources)
• Nolt op-ed: Amish grieving expresses forgiveness, not anger. Indianapolis Star. Oct. 4, 2007.
• The context of forgiveness. Chuck Colson’s BreakPoint Commentary. Oct. 3, 2007.
• An interview with Nolt: How can the Amish forgive what seems unforgivable? USAToday. Oct. 2, 2007.
• Authors describe Amish faith, forgiveness. Goshen News. Oct. 2, 2007.
• GC prof tells of Amish will to forgive. The Truth. Oct. 2, 2007. (free registration required)
• Among the Amish, a grace that endures. The Philadelphia Inquirer. Oct. 1, 2007.
• Nickel Mines legacy: Forgive first. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Sept. 30, 2007.
• ‘Amish Grace’ writers merged styles, ideas. Lancaster Intelligencer Journal. Sept. 25, 2007.
• Book explores Amish ability to forgive. Lancaster Intelligencer Journal. Sept. 24, 2007.
• Amish grace. Lancaster Sunday News. Sept. 23, 2007.
• Amish School Boys Struggle With Memories. Associated Press. Sept. 22, 2007.
• Steve Nolt interview on PBS’s Religion & Ethics Newsweekly. Sept. 21, 2007.
• Book excerpt on ChristianityToday.com. Sept. 17, 2007.

Goshen College Professor of History Steven M. Nolt, a leading expert on the Amish, is one of the co-authors of the new book “Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy” (Jossey-Bass, A Wiley Imprint, Sept. 27, 2007), which explores the history, theology and culture of the Amish, connecting forgiveness to their entire way of life. The book is based on conversations with over two dozen Amish people in the Nickel Mines area, including family members of the murdered children. The three Anabaptist authors – Nolt, Senior Fellow at the Young Center of Elizabethtown College Donald B. Kraybill and Associate Professor of American Religious History at Messiah College David L. Weaver-Zercher – also spoke to relatives of the gunman.

The Amish are a people “uncommonly prepared to respond with graciousness, forbearance, and love,” the authors say. Their extension of grace was neither calculated nor random, but emerged from who they were long before the awful day that claimed the lives of five of their children. The Amish stand in a centuries-old tradition that supports the decision to forgive. They believe God expects people to forgive and that their own martyred ancestors modeled forgiveness by not seeking revenge.

“It’s just what we do as nonresistant people. It was spontaneous. It was automatic. It was not a new kind of thing,” the Amish told the authors. Every Amish person they spoke with agreed: forgiveness for Roberts and grace for his family were spontaneous expressions of faith, not mandates from the church. It is woven into the fabric of their communal life, spun from faith in God, scriptural mandates and a history of persecution.

The Amish response to the Nickel Mines killings offers new insights into the possibilities and practices of forgiveness, even in the face of tragic and horrific human events. “Perhaps our real human need is to find ways to move beyond tragedy with a sense of healing and hope,” the authors write. “What we learn from the Amish, both at Nickel Mines and more generally, is that how we choose to move on from tragic injustice is culturally formed.”

“Regardless of the details of the Nickel Mines story one message rings clear: religion was not used to justify rage and revenge but to inspire goodness, forgiveness and grace,” the authors conclude. “And that is the big lesson for the rest of us regardless of our faith or nationality.”

The story of Amish forgiveness struck a chord around the world, because as Nolt said, “I think in a world where religion – rightly or wrongly – [only] becomes a news story when it is involved in stirring up hate and division, to have a story where religion is encouraging compassion seemed to be a new thing for a lot of people.”

Nolt hopes that the book spurs readers to examine their own lives and views on forgiveness. “I hope [readers] take something away from this about forgiveness that they can apply to themselves, and not just think, ‘Well, I either have to imitate the Amish, and that’s impossible, so I guess there is nothing here for me except to say that these are great people.’ That’s not what the Amish want. They don’t want that kind of praise. And also I don’t think that’s all that valuable. If anything, that just gets us off the hook from asking questions about ourselves.”

Nolt has taught at Goshen College since 1999. He received a doctorate in history from the University of Notre Dame, and a graduate theology degree from Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary. Nolt has studied Amish history and culture across many settlements. His books on the Amish include “A History of the Amish” (rev. ed., Good Books, 2003); “Amish Enterprise: From Plows to Profits” (2nd ed., with Donald B. Kraybill, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004); “Plain Diversity: Amish Cultures and Identities” (with Thomas J. Meyers, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007); and “Mennonites, Amish, and the American Civil War” (with James O. Lehman, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007).

Following the Oct. 2, 2006, shooting, the three authors explored reports about Amish forgiveness that followed in the wake of the shooting. They conducted many face-to-face interviews with Amish people to probe their beliefs about and their practice of forgiveness. In addition they pursued Amish writings on forgiveness as well as other historical examples in which Amish people expressed forgiveness to those who had wronged them, and reviewed hundreds of media stories and editorials on Amish forgiveness at Nickel Mines. Finally, the authors compared Amish practices of forgiveness with the broader research on forgiveness in American society. The research was conducted from Nov. 1, 2006 through April 1, 2007.

The book is already receiving high acclaim. Publishers Weekly Starred Review said, “This intelligent, compassionate and hopeful book is a welcome addition to the growing literature on forgiveness.” And the book’s endorsers include Bill Moyers, Jim Wallis, Sister Helen Prejean, Tony Campolo, Philip Yancey and Fred Luskin. For more information, visit www.amishgrace.com.

Because the authors did not want to profit off of this tragedy, all author royalties from “Amish Grace” are being donated to Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) to benefit children suffering because of poverty, war and natural disaster. MCC is a relief, development and peace agency of the North American Mennonite and Brethren in Christ churches.

The Fetzer Institute provided research funds for “Amish Grace” as part of its Campaign for Love & Forgiveness, www.fetzer.org/LoveAndForgive.

CONTACT:
Goshen College Professor of History Steven M. Nolt
Phone: (574) 535-7460
E-mail: stevemn@goshen.edu

BOOK INFORMATION:
“Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy”
by Donald B. Kraybill, Steven M. Nolt, David L. Weaver-Zercher
Jossey-Bass, A Wiley Imprint
SBN: 978-0-7879-9761-8
$24.95 cloth
PUB DATE: Sept. 27, 2007

Editors: For more information about this release, to arrange an interview or request a photo, contact Goshen College News Bureau Director Jodi H. Beyeler at (574) 535-7572 or jodihb@goshen.edu.

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Goshen College, established in 1894, is a residential Christian liberal arts college rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition. The college’s Christ-centered core values – passionate learning, global citizenship, compassionate peacemaking and servant-leadership – prepare students as leaders for the church and world. Recognized for its unique Study-Service Term program, Goshen has earned citations of excellence in Barron’s Best Buys in Education, “Colleges of Distinction,” “Making a Difference College Guide” and U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” edition, which named Goshen a “least debt college.” Visit www.goshen.edu.

Goshen professor’s sonnets reflect on Amish school tragedy

GOSHEN, Ind. — A Goshen College English professor and poet has taken the shock and horror of the Oct. 2 Amish school shootings and transformed it into an evocative, deeply affecting work of reflection.

Ann Hostetler, professor of English and chair of the English Department, recently completed a cycle of four “Sonnets for the Amish Girls of Nickel Mines.”

Hostetler – whose father, the late sociologist John A. Hostetler, was raised Amish – said news of the shootings came as a great shock to her last year. “I found it kind of unbelievable at first,” Hostetler said in an interview. “It was the same kind of shock as when one of my friends called me (on Sept. 11, 2001) and said one of the towers just went down.”

On hearing the news, Hostetler said, her mind quickly went to a visit she had made to an Amish school the year before with fellow poet B.H. Fairchild, who had been moved by the school’s “sacred” environment. “It was just an unthinkably violent act,” Hostetler said of the shootings. “And to see how a stranger, an intruder came in and just violated that sacred space . . . I just kept thinking of those little girls standing in front of that blackboard.”

During the incident, which claimed the lives of five Amish schoolgirls in Bart Township, Pa., milk truck driver Charles Carl Roberts IV bound 10 Amish girls and lined them up at the front of their classroom. When Pennsylvania State Police attempted to storm the one-room building, which the gunman had barricaded, Roberts opened fire on the children. He committed suicide when state troopers, eluding a final blast from his shotgun, forced their way in.

Killed were Naomi Rose Ebersole, 7; Anna Mae Stoltzfus, 12; Marian Fisher, 13; Mary Liz Miller, 8; and her sister, Lena Miller, 7. The five surviving children, all of them seriously wounded, face years of recovery and rehabilitation.

In her poems, Hostetler evokes the scene of fear in the schoolroom and the chaos the shootings brought into the quietly ordered Amish world. “The poems come out of a deep inner place,” Hostetler said. “A good poem can provide a space where you can put your complicated thoughts and not feel like you have to come up with a platitude.”

By using the form of a sonnet, with its precise rhyme scheme and meter, Hostetler said she hoped to bring her own kind of order to the subject. “Maybe there’s a kind of formality to processing it this way,” she said. “Maybe the sonnet is a form that can deal with this.”

Hostetler also alludes to the forgiveness the Amish publicly offered to Roberts and the comfort extended to his widow and three small children. “I think there are many people in our world who can’t understand that forgiveness at all,” Hostetler said. “But it’s actually a radical act, the forgiveness there. Their witness is profoundly needed in this world.”

Hostetler has a bachelor’s degree from Kenyon College, a master’s degree from Pennsylvania State and a doctorate degree from the University of Pennsylvania. She began teaching at Goshen College in 1998 and the courses she teaches include introduction to creative writing, poetry writing and creative nonfiction.

She is the author of “Empty Room with Light: Poems” (2002, Dreamseeker Books) and editor of the anthology “A Cappella: Mennonite Voices in Poetry” (2003, University of Iowa Press). She has published articles in the Mennonite Quarterly Review, PMLA and the Emerson Studies Quarterly. Hostetler also has published poetry in “The American Scholar,” “The Cream City Review,” “Mankato Poetry Review” and other literary journals.

— By Robert Rhodes for Mennonite Weekly Review

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Sonnets for the Amish Girls of Nickel Mines

By Ann Hostetler

I.

He tied their legs together, made them face

the blackboard, released their brothers, mothers,

teachers, then barred the doors with two-by-fours.

Ten pairs of toes lined up in place.

Ten pairs of arms could not erase

a moment set in motion by such error.

Ten starched white caps could not conceal their terror

as ten heads bowed in simple grace.

Where once they took their turns to stand apart

and write a sum or sentence they had learned,

(the unprepared might feel some mild concern),

they now could hear each others’ beating hearts

as his handgun called the roll—Mary,

Lena, Marian, Anna Mae, Naomi Rose.

II.

Naomi Rose, Mary, Lena, Marian

and Anna Mae – dressed in white by family

and placed in wooden caskets on display

for last loving looks from friends and kin –

now ride in somber carriages again

past the home of him who took their life away

leaving a family puzzled and betrayed

of all they thought he could be as a man.

Their last journey protected by patrol

– even reporters must have a pass –

they move on to church and grave. We are left

without a verse or story to console

us on an autumn day whose shining grass

reflects the sun, a blue sky of clouds bereft.

III.

A blue sky of clouds bereft, wide open

to receive the innocent. But those who live

must have their explanation; the other five

girls recover in intensive care – again

they’ll have to live the moments of their pain

even as their families struggle to forgive

the gunman, receive his widow, kids.

For us or them, life will never be the same.

We wait to gather crumbs of consolation

from what they can remember or will tell

of what’s unspeakable: the oldest girl

offering to be shot in lieu of others,

her slumped body found beneath chalked letters:

unexpected visitors bring sunshine.

IV.

Unexpected visitors bring sunshine:

the covered casserole still oven-warm,

gleaming jars of produce from the farm

home-preserved: peaches, cucumbers in brine,

blackberry jam, hard-boiled eggs stained with wine

of red-beet juice. This red will do no harm.

This giver’s knock brings blessing, not alarm,

an offering to those who’ve lost in kind.

The scattered toys, the silent house awash

in grief that stunned a family unable

to believe what had been done. The Amish

givers ease the unlocked door ajar and rest

the box of food on the empty kitchen table.

Forgiveness is the unexpected guest.

© 2006 by Ann Hostetler. All rights reserved.

Editors: For more information about this release, to arrange an interview or request a photo, contact Goshen College News Bureau Director Jodi H. Beyeler at (574) 535-7572 or jodihb@goshen.edu.

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Goshen College, established in 1894, is a residential Christian liberal arts college rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition. The college’s Christ-centered core values – passionate learning, global citizenship, compassionate peacemaking and servant-leadership – prepare students as leaders for the church and world. Recognized for its unique Study-Service Term program, Goshen has earned citations of excellence in Barron’s Best Buys in Education, “Colleges of Distinction,” “Making a Difference College Guide” and U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” edition, which named Goshen a “least debt college.” Visit www.goshen.edu.