Wycliffe Bible Translators of Canada • Summer 2006
Scriptures in their Plautdietsch
mother tongue help Mennonites
on three continents rediscover the
gospel and deepen their faith.
50th Anniversary of Missionary Deaths
Fighting Avian Flu
The New Face of Missions
Summer 2006 • Volume 24, Number 2
Mennonite origins
The Mennonite/Plautdietsch Migration
Locations featured in Word Alive stories
Countries with largest populations of Plautdietsch
speakers
General Mennonite/Plautdietsch migrations through
history (see details in timeline, pgs. 4-29)
Source: See timeline, pg. 29.
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Focus Sommaborscht and Plautdietsch
Word Watch
50th Anniversary of Five Missionary Deaths Remembered; and more
Eureka! The New Face of Missions
Quoteworthy
“This is my only joy and heart’s desire: to extend the
Kingdom of God, reveal the truth, reprove sin, teach
righteousness, feed hungry souls with the Word of the
Lord, lead the straying sheep into the right path. . . .”
—Menno Simons (1496-1531), Dutch Anabaptist
leader, after whom Mennonites are named
Word Alive, which takes its name from Hebrews 4:12a, is the official publication of Wycliffe Bible
Translators of Canada. Its mission is to inform, inspire and involve the Christian public as partners in
the worldwide Bible translation movement.
Editors: Dwayne Janke, Dave Crough
Designer: Laird Salkeld
Staff Writers: Janet Seever, Doug Lockhart, Deborah Crough
Staff Photographers: Dave Crough, Alan Hood
Web Version Designer: Kenji Kondo
COVER
At the Evangelical Mennonite Church in
Pailón, Bolivia, a young Mennonite girl and
her Bolivian friend enjoy music—and each
other’s company—during a Sunday morning
service. The fair-skinned youngster belongs to
one of the scores of Mennonite families who
are attempting to build new lives outside the
familiar confines of Bolivia’s colonies.
Photograph by Dave Crough
BY
DWAYNE
JANKE
Sommaborscht
and Plautdietsch
I
In a dim basement on a warm, sunny Sunday afternoon
in the sleepy southern Alberta town of Vauxhall, I join
in a common Christian event: the Canadian church
F
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4
Bolivia: Fresh Breezes
Bolivia articles by Doug Lockhart
Photographs by Dave Crough
Canada/Germany articles by Dwayne Janke
Photographs by Alan Hood
S
in a Barren Land
Outcast families from Mennonite colonies
find hope to rebuild their lives through
God’s Word in Plautdietsch.
12
Bolivia: Sending
a Clear Signal
18
Canada: Little
Church on the Prairie
Gospel radio programs using Plautdietsch
Scriptures are finding a ready audience
among reclusive Mennonites.
With a steady influx of their people from
Mexico, evangelical Mennonites from
conservative backgrounds around Vauxhall,
Alberta, reach out using Plautdietsch
Scriptures.
24
Germany:
We Came Home
As Mennonite Germans from Russia,
the Berg family made the challenging
and life-changing choice to start anew
in Germany. They have lots of company.
Word Alive is published four times annually by Wycliffe Bible
Translators of Canada, 4316 10 St NE, Calgary, AB T2E 6K3.
Copyright 2006 by Wycliffe Bible Translators of Canada. Permission
to reprint articles and other magazine contents may be obtained
by written request to the editors. A donation of $10 annually
is suggested to cover the cost of printing and mailing the
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Member: The Canadian Church Press, Evangelical Press Association
For additional copies: media_resources@wycliffe.ca
To contact Word Alive editors: [email protected]
For address updates: circulation@wycliffe.ca
Note to readers: References to “SIL” are occasionally made in
Word Alive. SIL is Wycliffe’s main partner organization, dedicated
to training, language research, translation and literacy.
potluck. This time, however, as I eat with the folks at
Vauxhall Evangelical Mennonite Missions Conference (EMMC)
church, the food is quite a bit different than what I’m used to.
A few long tables covered with pots, pans and glass dishes
represent the history and migration of Mennonites through 500
years and at least four countries. Along the way, they acquired
favourite foods that accompanied them on their pilgrimage from
northern Europe to Prussia, Russia and the Americas. There’s
“Roll Kuchen”/“Rollkoke” (deep-fried dough shaped like bow
ties); “Sommaborscht” (beet and vegetable soup); “Kirschen
Mus”/“Tjoaschemoos” (cherries mixed with milk and sugar); and
enchiladas and tacos.
The smell of these foods isn’t the only thing filling the basement
air at the Vauxhall church. When these hospitable folks aren’t talking in English to be polite to their visitors, I’m hearing a different
language, called Plautdietsch (PLOWT-deech). It was also picked
up during the Mennonite pilgrimage.
Plautdietsch is a variety of Low German which emerged approximately 450 years ago in the Vistula delta area of western Prussia
(now Poland). Mennonite speakers of Plautdietsch emigrated from
Prussia through southern Russia (present-day Ukraine), and then
on to the Americas, including Canada. Characterized by many
more different vowel combinations than standard High German,
Plautdietsch has been an important part of Mennonite ethnic
identity. But only in recent decades has God’s Word been translated into the language. Wycliffe personnel were involved all through
the Bible translation process (see timeline, pgs. 24, 26).
We realize that many of Wycliffe Canada’s friends and personnel share a Mennonite/Plautdietsch heritage. So, in this issue of
Word Alive, we take you to three very different countries—Bolivia,
Canada and Germany—where these Scriptures are being used
to help Plautdietsch speakers clearly understand biblical truth.
To put it all into perspective, we also give you a timeline of the
Mennonite pilgrimage with Plautdietsch over the centuries. In
addition, other exclusive stories will be posted on our Web site
<www.wycliffe.ca/wordalive>.
Plautdietsch may be more than four centuries old. But as you
will read, God is still doing new things in the lives of its speakers
these many years later.
Wycliffe Canada Vision Statement:
A world where translated Scriptures lead to
transformed lives among people of all languages.
Canadian Head Office:
4316 10 St NE, Calgary, AB T2E 6K3.
Phone: (403) 250-5411 or toll free 1-800-463-1143,
8:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m. mountain time
Fax: (403) 250-2623. E-mail: [email protected]
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
3
bolivia
Outcast families from Mennonite colonies
find hope to rebuild their lives through
God’s Word in Plautdietsch.
BY DOUG LOCKHART
PHOTOGRAPHS BY DAVE CROUGH
Pilgrimage with Plautdietsch
Mennonite History in Brief
BY DWAYNE JANKE
4
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
His face, lined and haggard, speaks eloquently of the suffering
and disappointment he’s endured. Shy and wary of strangers, John Peters glances here and there during our interview,
through eyes pausing only long enough to stare at the shadowy
memories of better times.
1520s-30s “Radical Anabaptists” (“rebaptizers”), starting with
Conrad Grebel’s Zurich group, emerge during the Protestant
Reformation in Switzerland, Holland and Germany.
1527 Felix Manz is the first Anabaptist executed
for his beliefs by Protestant authorities.
1536-1561 Menno Simons (right) is the influential leader
of Anabaptists in Holland/northern Germany. These
“Mennonites” emphasize adult baptism, personal Bible
interpretation, loyalty to God’s kingdom, & peace.
Mennonite Heritage Centre Archives, Winnipeg, Manitoba
Peters, whose troubles include throat and lip cancer, is an
outcast Mennonite in central Bolivia—one of hundreds living
outside the established colonies surrounding the dusty town of
Pailón, some 60 km east of Santa Cruz.
Although many like Peters have grown up in one of the
region’s 42 colonies, they are no longer welcome. Some of the
men have managed to find work and basic housing for their
families, despite poor education, few marketable skills and
the nagging shame that dogs them for leaving behind lifelong
friends and extended families.
Their reasons for retreating vary. Many who choose to leave
the colonies are frustrated by agricultural policies, set by
colony leaders, that have left their fields barren and their children hungry. Others have been forced out for questioning the
authority of the elders.
Santa Cruz, but they’re not welcome here. Shunned by leaders,
former friends—and even relatives—they’re among the hundreds
of colonists calling for reforms. The Banmans have even started
a church of 30 families that meets on their farm. The group uses
the Plautdietsch Bible.
But the discontent that prompted many Mennonites to leave
their colonies has also contributed to their spiritual awakening. Fresh breezes have begun to blow in this semi-tropical
region: Mennonite families are growing in their understanding
of God’s Word, through a variety of ministries that demonstrate His love in practical ways and provide biblical teaching
in their heart language, Plautdietsch.
“The people in Pailón are a unique group of Mennonites . . .
in that they’ve been excommunicated or have left the colonies,” says Darrell Kehler, a field director for the Evangelical
Mennonite Mission Conference (EMMC). “Many of them feel
they didn’t get the spiritual help they needed, or other help. . . .
“There’s a lot of parents that feel they need education for
their children.”
(continued on pg. 7)
To 1600 Growing persecution drives Anabaptists/
Mennonites to secret meetings & into countrysides.
5,000 Anabaptists are killed in Europe (right).
Fractionalism over applying doctrine becomes
characteristic of Mennonites.
Martyrs Mirror
(Both pages) Outcasts from Bolivia’s Mennonite colonies stand at
the forefront of a quiet revolution. Frustrated by antiquated
farming policies and a stifling spiritual climate, many have begun to
question the colony system’s strict rules and to study the Scriptures
for themselves. This family, the Banmans, live on a colony east of
This Mennonite boy (right) stands between
two worlds, living out of context from both the
broader Bolivian society around him and the
Mennonite colony that he and his family left.
Some Mennonites are no longer welcome at this roadside
church (below) on Esperanza Colony—especially those who have
challenged elders over interpretations of the Bible. Furthermore,
leaders do not allow readings from the Plautdietsch Scriptures.
The only acceptable Bible is a translation in High German, a
language few colonists understand well.
Lisa Janzen (right) listens as Tina Banman talks about her family’s
strained relations with colony neighbours. One of 14 children, Janzen
was raised in a Bolivian colony but left for Canada at age 17, following
the accidental deaths of her parents and a younger sister. Although she
and her husband Dave now serve as missionaries to Bolivia’s displaced
Mennonites, she rarely sees one sister who still lives on a nearby colony.
“She’d love to have contact with us,” says Lisa, “but can’t because her
husband . . . won’t allow us to see each other.”
6
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
Peter Wiens
Mid-1500s-early 1600s Invited by landowners and city
councils, repressed Dutch and north German Mennonites,
speaking Nether Saxon Low German, stream to the
Danzig/Vistula River delta region of West Prussia.
1500s-late 1780s Mennonites turn Prussian marshland into rich farm
settlements (left). They adopt the local Nether Saxon dialect for daily
conversation; add their own vocabulary to it—creating Plautdietsch
(“Low German).” High German/Luther’s Bible becomes dominant in
church, replacing Dutch, in the 18th century.
Set Apart
That desire alone sets the outcasts apart from the friends
and family members they left behind. Traditionally, Bolivia’s
Mennonites provide only the basic schooling their children
need to equip them for life in the colony, in the belief that anything more leads to “worldliness.”
At the Evangelical Mennonite Church in Pailón, about 30
More on the Web Watch for other stories families are receiving education
about Bolivia’s outcast Mennonites at
for their kids, biblical teaching
<www.wycliffe.ca/wordalive>.
and more.
Canadian missionaries Dave and Lisa Janzen of La Crete,
Alta., and others on their leadership team are reaching out to
these displaced Mennonites.
De Bibel, a Plautdietsch translation published in 2003, is
central to their ministry.
“The Plautdietsch Bible has been very useful for us,” says
Dave, who has served in Bolivia since 1998, under the EMMC
and the Bergthaler Mennonite Churches of Northern Alberta.
“It’s so plain and clear that they can understand exactly what
I read.”
Translation consultants from Wycliffe Canada and Wycliffe
1680s-1824 Swiss & south German Mennonites migrate
to Pennsylvania. Later, many move to British Upper Canada
(southern Ontario). Their German mother tongue evolves
from High German to “Pennsylvania Deutsch (Dutch).”
“ The Plautdietsch Bible . . . is so
plain and clear that they can
understand exactly what I read.”
—Dave Janzen, missionary to
Bolivia’s marginalized Mennonites
1786-1787 Prussia’s 13, 000 Mennonites are
troubled when King Frederick William II makes
them pay military exemption fines and tithe to the
Lutheran Church. He also stops their land purchases.
1788-89 Catherine the Great (left) extends special privileges (including 175 acres of land per household) to Prussian Mennonites, sparking
migration of 228 families to southern Russia (creating 8 villages in the
so-called Chortitza colony). Plautdietsch goes with them, initially used
in Mennonite schools/churches. Government relates to Mennonites in
High German, though they are unskilled in it.
U.S. contributed to the translation, along with various Bible
societies and other partners (see timeline, pgs. 24, 26).
Short-term ministry teams organized by Campus Crusade’s
Winnipeg office have handed out nearly 2,000 Plautdietsch
Bibles in Bolivia so far. The ministry aims to provide a Bible for
each family among the country’s 45,000-50,000 Mennonites.
Separation and Sin
While outsiders might think Bolivia’s Mennonite leaders
would celebrate the arrival of God’s Word in their language,
the opposite is true. In the colonies, Scripture is read aloud in
High German, even though few colonists understand that language well. It’s a deliberate choice, based on traditional beliefs
that too much knowledge may lead to pride and worldliness.
Bolivia’s Mennonites, many of them from conservative colony backgrounds, began arriving en masse during the ’60s from
Paraguay, Mexico and Canada (see timeline, pg. 20.) They
embrace a simple, traditional way of life that was originally
intended to protect them from
More on the Web For more details
about the history and different types of worldly influences and to promote
Mennonites, visit <www.mhsc.ca>. godly living. But those who min-
ister among them say the colony Mennonites’ strict rules and
narrow interpretations of Scripture have robbed them of the
joy and freedom found in Christ.
Their prohibition against using rubber tires on farm equipment is a case in point. Some believe the rule was designed to
prevent Mennonite young people from making unsupervised
trips to nearby towns.
Regardless of its original intent, the decades-old practice
of using steel wheels has left the soil in some colonies hardpacked. In the hot, dry climate of central Bolivia, moisture
quickly evaporates on the hardened soil.
Troubled and Vulnerable
Another controversy has arisen because some colony leaders
refuse to abandon traditional seeding methods, despite consistently poor crops. That policy has also added to the colonists’
frustration.
Beginning in the late ’90s, dozens of outcast families started
drifting into Pailón and other Spanish-speaking towns in
search of employment. High unemployment rates, depression and other problems drive many to alcohol, drugs, sexual
(continued on pg. 10)
1789-1803 Despite difficulties, Russian Mennonite
population growth & ongoing immigration lead to
creation of a dozen more Chortitza region colonies
(like one depicted on map at left). The settlements
reflect Mennonite factions & degrees of strictness.
1803-31 Russia’s government provides
more settlement land (324,000 acres).
Hundreds of Mennonite immigrant
families found 40+ villages in the
so-called Molotschna colony.
1840s Johann Cornies leads Mennonite school reform: Russian is
taught & High German made the language of education, though
evolving Plautdietsch is still the mother tongue. Mennonite High
German begins to evolve into a vocabulary limited by narrow
church/school use & influenced by Plautdietsch.
Mennonite Heritage Centre Archives, Winnipeg, Manitoba
Mennonite children and their Sunday school teacher at the Pailón
church have few resources to work with, but the Spartan classroom
offers some respite from the heat and ever-present dust outside. Most
of these children also receive Christian education at a nearby school
sponsored by the Evangelical Mennonite Mission Conference (EMMC).
Like churchgoers everywhere, these Mennonite families converge outside
the Pailón church before the morning service to share a joke or catch up
on the latest news. (Below) A group of teens gather around their motorcycles. A few of them carry cell phones—a modern convenience that’s strictly
banned on Bolivia’s colonies.
“ The Plautdietsch Bible has
been a real door-opener
among the Mennonites
in Bolivia.”
1859 Prussian Mennonite settlers in Russia
number 34,500. Most are farmers (left), but
some are industrialists. More are becoming
educated, with emphasis on the arts.
Mennonite Heritage Centre Archives, Winnipeg, Manitoba
—Norman Brown,
Campus Crusade of Canada
1860s Russia’s Mennonites are split into 10 different
independent congregations, with more to come. There are
economic divisions: rich landowners (left) controlling local
government, versus a growing, poor landless majority.
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
9
Touching Hearts
Colony Mennonites and outcasts alike hunger for programs
that feature Plautdietsch music and Bible teaching, says
Dorothy Fehr of the FM radio ministry.
Dorothy and her husband Jake have heard that 15 people
from one colony gather around a radio and listen every week
to Plautdietsch broadcasts.
The couple hears many such stories. Furthermore, Bolivia’s
Mennonites are hungry to read the Bible for themselves—
something unheard of in past generations.
“The Plautdietsch Bible has been a real door-opener among the
Mennonites in Bolivia,” says Norman Brown, who oversees distribution of De Bibel in Bolivia for Campus Crusade of Canada.
“The comments we hear most often from people as they
read De Bibel are, ‘That is so clear,’ or ‘Now I understand what
it is saying.’ ”
Brown believes that many Mennonites in Bolivia need
Scriptures in the language they speak and understand to
clearly hear the good news about Christ.
A Living Word
Mennonite Heritage Centre Archives, Winnipeg, Manitoba
God’s Word is coming alive for Elizabeth Froese, who lives
in Pailón with her husband Peter, their five children and
other needy Mennonite kids they shelter. She has underlined
Colossians 1:12-14 in her Plautdietsch Bible.
“These verses talk about security,” says Froese, through an
interpreter, “how we have now been set free and that we’re
heirs of the kingdom of God.
“I read them over and over . . . it means so much to know
I’m forgiven.”
For cancer victim John Peters, who regularly attends the
church in Pailón, promises from God’s Word are about all he
has to cling to.
“He has a very clear testimony of faith,” says Lisa Janzen,
1859-1900 With a population of 8,400 (mostly
landless families), Chortitza colonies begin
large-scale land acquisition for nearly 60 new
daughter villages (left) outside their region.
10
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
“but work is scarce so he finds it hard to provide for his family’s daily food.”
Peters and his family were among the hundreds of local
Mennonites who attended church-sponsored evangelistic
meetings last fall. A few indicated their desire to follow Christ,
while many more responded to invitations for prayer and
counselling.
The Pailón church also saw 27 new members added to their
fellowship, which averages about 150 attendees on any given
Sunday.
While such developments are a great encouragement to the
ministry team in Pailón, they know displaced Mennonites still
face many challenges as they try to establish themselves outside the colonies.
For example, many are deeply saddened by broken relationships with friends and family members.
Lisa, who lived in an area colony as a child, knows such pain
firsthand. Since returning to Bolivia with Dave in 1998, she
has tried to maintain contact with a married sister still living
in a nearby colony.
“I can’t see her,” says Lisa. “Her husband is very much against us
as well as evangelical Christianity. So we never get to visit her. . . . ”
A Vision for Change
As the Janzens and their colleagues have pondered ways to
help the beleaguered families rebuild their lives, a new dream
has emerged.
“Our vision is to establish a community . . . not run by the
church,” says Dave. “It would be a co-operative, run by a central organization of some kind.”
Canadian Mennonite farmers and businessmen, mainly
from Saskatchewan, have already made financial pledges
towards the project. Roads have been built and wells dug on
land north of Pailón.
“These businessmen are interested in helping outcasts get
into income-generating projects,” adds Dave, “so they can get
back on their feet economically.”
So far, about 40 families have applied to buy small plots of
land. Habitat For Humanity, a Christian organization that specializes in building homes for the needy, is set for construction
of the first 18 homes this year.
If successful, the new community could help restore hope
among Bolivia’s impoverished Mennonites. But ultimately,
their true hope rests in the One who walks with them in
Pailón’s dusty streets and speaks to them now in the language
of their hearts.
1860s-1900 Molotschna settlement’s 900 founding
families grow to 4,000—more than half are landless. Land
shortages & religious divisions cause major immigration to
new Black Sea areas and beyond. Nearly 90 new daughter
colonies are formed.
1861-1880 Government “Russification” reforms
make the Russian language a compulsory subject
in schools. Plautdietsch is still used in worship
& preaching, but Mennonites teach more High
German to preserve their non-Russian identity.
Glenbow Archives NA-264-1
immorality—or even suicide—as a means of escape. Similar
problems exist within the colonies, but little help is available. In
fact, many colony leaders seem more concerned with policing
the colonies for such worldly possessions as cell phones and
radio, say area missionaries.
Despite the leaders’ efforts to ban them, both cell phones
and radios have become popular contraband in a cat-andmouse game that forces Mennonite listeners to use them
covertly. But many colony Mennonites are secretly listening to
gospel programming in Plautdietsch, broadcast by Radio Trans
Mundial (see related story, pg. 12).
Although stern and disapproving neighbours in a local colony surround
them, the Banman children can enjoy some simple pleasures once
denied to them (above). Elizabeth Froese (right), at her home in Pailón,
is also tasting freedom of a different sort—the liberty that comes from
knowing her sins are forgiven.
“I read them [verses from Colossians]
over and over…it means so much to
know I’m forgiven.”
1870s Mennonites are not completely exempt from the
Russian government’s new military service law, & lose
some school autonomy. One-third of the 18,000 population
leaves for North America, nearly half to Manitoba (left),
with special privileges. Plautdietsch migrates to Canada.
1881 A census
shows nearly 7,800
Mennonites reside
in Manitoba.
Glenbow Archives NA-5556-4
—Outcast Mennonite Elizabeth Froese
1890s-1911 Russian Mennonites begin to settle
in Saskatchewan, Alberta (left) and B.C. They are
followed by Mennonites from Manitoba; then
some from Russia in 1923-30 and after WWII.
1902 First study focused on Plautdietsch
spoken by Mennonites in Prussia is published
in a dissertation by J. Regehr in Königsberg.
1912 In Russia, J.H. Janzen writes
Plautdietsch playlets, the first
Mennonite generally known to have
published in the language.
Mennonite Library & Archives, Bethel College
Seen from high atop Radio Trans Mundial’s antenna tower outside the town of
Pailón, sunrise spreads its warming rays westward across the landscape. The roundthe-clock FM station and partner of Trans World Radio, is helping quench the thirst
for Plautdietsch-language gospel programs among Bolivia’s colony Mennonites.
1914-1919 World War I & Bolshevik Revolution: many of
the 80,000-100,000 Mennonites in Russia die of illness or
in massacres by marauding bandits. Goods are plundered;
communities disrupted and ravaged.
bolivia
Gospel radio programs using Plautdietsch
Scriptures are finding a ready audience
among reclusive Mennonites.
BY DOUG LOCKHART
PHOTOGRAPHS BY DAVE CROUGH
When Evangelical Free Church of Canada missionaries Jake
and Dorothy Fehr first launched an FM gospel radio station
in Bolivia in 2001, they initially targeted the region’s Spanish
and Quechua-speaking listeners as well as Portuguese-speaking
1917-1921 Christians (including Mennonites) are
increasingly persecuted, imprisoned & executed,
& churches restricted under Russia’s Leninist
government. Clergy losses are significant.
Glenbow Archives NA-2920-1
immigrants from neighbouring Brazil. But the Fehrs, who both
come from Mennonite backgrounds, also sensed God nudging them to reach out to Bolivia’s colony Mennonites through a
Plautdietsch-language program on Radio Trans Mundial (RTM).
They obeyed, airing a weekly 30-minute program of music
and preaching. To the Fehrs, 30 minutes per week seemed plenty
because, they reasoned, Mennonites in the South American
country are forbidden by their leaders to own radios.
But within days of the first Plautdietsch broadcast, Mennonite
men began visiting the station’s compound near the town of
Pailón.
“One man said, ‘Finally we have our own radio station . . .
we’ve got [Low] German,’ ” recalls Dorothy.
“Right from the beginning, they begged for more Plautdietsch
programs, so then we knew people were listening.”
Today, the round-the-clock partner station of Trans World
1919 Influenced by super-patriotism, Canada’s government prohibits
entry of “German” Mennonites. Despite protests, the door for relatives in
Russia isn’t reopened until several years later (see timeline photo, pg. 14).
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca 13
1921-1941 Russia’s Mennonites are given
“national district” status for their colonies,
where they can use German in schools,
courts & public business. But districts are
really controlled by Moscow.
1922-30 Scores of Mennonites lose
their property following the Russian
Revolution. Uncertain about the future,
21,000 Mennonites move to Canada (right).
Another 4,000 go to Mexico/South America.
Photo Collection, Centre for Mennonite
Brethren Studies, Winnipeg NP007-1-7
Saskatoon native Jake Fehr (above) felt prompted by God in 2001 to launch a 30-minute weekly program in
Plautdietsch. The enthusiastic response—from colony Mennonites who are not supposed to own radios—has led to
expanded programming that now totals 18 hours per week. His wife Dorothy (below, left) helps administrate the station, which also broadcasts in Spanish, Quechua and Portuguese. Following the Sunday morning service at the Pailón
church, Dorothy chats with a Mennonite woman holding her own copy of De Bibel. Campus Crusade volunteers from
Manitoba have already distributed more than 2,000 Plautdietsch Bibles in Bolivia.
Radio broadcasts 18 hours of Plautdietsch programming each
week, including Scripture-based sermons drawn from De
Bibel. Some area Mennonites have even asked the Fehrs to
broadcast exclusively in Plautdietsch.
That kind of hunger for gospel programming is a great
encouragement to the couple from Saskatoon—especially
when they remember their darkest hour.
In February 2002, just four months after the station opened,
the Fehrs’ 18-year-old son Kelly was washing the family’s pet
dog outside when he inadvertently placed the dog’s metal
chain on a highly conductive brace connected to a large air
conditioning unit. Live electrical current coursed through
Kelly’s body, killing him instantly.
“In a lot of ways, life stopped,” Jake says. “You have to keep
on living, but a lot of things just stopped for us.”
“But after three months of deep, deep pain,” Dorothy adds
tearfully, “we finally just thought, ‘Okay, we’ve got to keep
going. That’s when Jake got going with the blueprints and we
started building our new station, studio and apartments.
“We thank the Lord that He did give us strength and is giving us strength . . . but it still is hard.”
Building Through Broadcasting
While their hearts still ache for Kelly, the Fehrs have found
grace to press on.
“Even though it’s a tremendous struggle,” says Jake, “I would
rather be in this struggle than anywhere else. To us, it’s exciting to see God using the radio as a ministry. . . .
“It’s building the Church of Jesus Christ in Bolivia.”
Every month, the station distributes 1,000 program CDs to
99 stations throughout the country. Its 2,000-watt transmitter
reaches audiences up to 250 km away—including a potential
audience of at least 45,000 colony Mennonites and a growing
number of colony outcasts (see related story, pg. 4).
However, many listeners in the colonies must guard against
being caught.
“Teenage children will actually be sleeping under their covers in bed,” says Dorothy, “and there will be two in a bed and
they’ll each have one ear phone, listening to the radio.”
While most Canadians take listening to the radio for granted, Jake says Bolivia’s Mennonites, many of them from conservative colony backgrounds, live in fear of leaders who go
to extreme lengths to protect their communities from outside
influences.
“In one colony, a lot of people were listening to RTM and . . . the
colony leaders cracked down on them. They ex-communicated a
few people and ordered all radios and cell phones to be rounded
up. They literally . . . take a hammer to them, smash them.”
Despite their fears of discovery, many listeners have secretly
replaced their radios so they can continue listening to RTM.
1922-1927 7,000 conservative Canadian Mennonites,
concerned about losing promises made to their forefathers,
purchase hundreds of thousands of acres of land and leave
to establish the first of eventually 100 colonies in northern
Mexico. Their mother tongue goes with them.
“Right from the beginning, they begged
for more Plautdietsch programs, so
then we knew people were listening.”
—Dorothy Fehr of Radio
Trans Mundial, Bolivia
1926 Nearly 1,800 conservative Manitoba & Saskatchewan
Mennonites emigrate to Paraguay (left), under favourable
concessions, taking Plautdietsch along. As in other Mennonite
settlements, High German is the church language.
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca 15
Relaxing at his home in Pailón,
mechanic William Siemens chats
with friends in the back yard. Like
many outcast Mennonites, he and
his wife Margaret are seldom far
from their radio, which is preset
to the frequency used by Radio
Trans Mundial. The gospel station
has sold more than 700 of the
inexpensive sets, most of them to
Bolivia’s colony Mennonites.
Plautdietsch-language broadcasts are helping
communicate the good news about Jesus to
Bolivia’s colony Mennonites, like these men
visiting a market area of Santa Cruz. Through
Bible programs and gospel music broadcast
by RTM, many are clearly hearing about God’s
transforming love and grace for the first time
in a language they can clearly understand.
16
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
1928 Stalin’s agricultural collectivization creates harsh
conditions for Mennonites & other German-Russian colonists.
Thousands relocate to German refugee camps. From there,
several thousand Mennonites move on to Paraguay & Brazil.
Alan Hood
1928 Walter Quiring becomes the first Mennonite
to publish a scholarly study on the Plautdietsch
dialect spoken in Russia.
The station sells pre-set devices, which only pick up their station’s signal, for a few dollars each.
The Fehrs estimate they’ve sold more than 700 of the pre-set
types, most of them to colony Mennonites.
Listeners even find ways to call Jake—using cell phones
they’re not supposed to own—while he’s hosting live broadcasts.
“At the most, I have a minute or so to talk . . . but many
times they would like to tell you a story. So we’re looking forward to the time when we’ll have a little more help to answer
the phones, plus operate the radio.”
“Many of their calls are just to encourage us,” adds Dorothy.
“They’ll say, ‘Don’t ever be discouraged, because you don’t
know how your radio is helping us.’ ”
Growing Interest—and Opposition
RTM’s selection of Plautdietsch programs has expanded significantly since its inaugural broadcast five years ago. Back then,
the Fehrs had very little Plautdietsch literature to read on-air
and just 25 songs to choose from.
The couple started contacting Mennonite friends and family
members in Canada and Mexico, alerting them to the urgent
need for Plautdietsch music. As a result, RTM’s music library
has grown to include about 380 songs—including music sung
by EMMC missionary Lisa Janzen.
“Lisa has her own album,” says Dorothy. “Listeners love her . . .
we’ve played it over and over again.
“Other local people are producing their own program now.
They’re translating songs into Plautdietsch and singing them
on the air.”
In addition to music, the station airs several gospel programs that include Scripture-based sermons drawn from
De Bibel. They include “What Does the Bible Say?” by John
Dyck, “Light of the Gospel” by Jacob Funk and “The Gospel
Message” by Ed Martens.
Some colony Mennonites also appreciate Spanish-language
programs like “Thru the Bible” by J. Vernon McGee. One
elderly man, whose radio was confiscated by colony leaders,
reportedly told his son-in-law, “I had to go and get another
radio, because I really want to listen to ‘Thru the Bible.’ ”
The Fehrs believe radio is the best tool to help Bolivia’s
colony Mennonites. That’s because outsiders cannot bring
Plautdietsch Bibles or gospel literature into the colonies, and
public Bible reading is always in High German—a language
that few colonists understand.
“I believe there are a lot of Mennonites that simply need to
understand the Word of God,” says Jake. “They need to hear it
in their language.
“Today, with Christian radio, they’re hearing it.”
“I believe there are a lot of
Mennonites that simply need to
understand the Word of God.”
—Jake Fehr, director of
Radio Trans Mundial
1929-35 Anti-religion measures intensify under Stalin’s Soviet
Russia: “godlessness” officially promoted, clergy/lay pastors
arrested (left), churches closed, including among Mennonites.
1935 In the past century,
Mennonites have established
another 45 colonies in Russia,
some as far flung as Siberia.
1936-38 Reacting to Hitler’s rise, Stalin further penalizes
German Russians: village/church leaders & wealthy farmers are
sent to slave labour camps. Many are never seen again. German
schools & churches are closed. Bible printing is banned.
Billowing thunderclouds brood over the flat prairie near Vauxhall in
southern Alberta, home to an ever-increasing number of conservative
Mexican Mennonites. Arriving with farming backgrounds, many can
get jobs in the agricultural-based economy of the region. Some also
find a living faith through the outreach of Vauxhall EMMC Church.
canada
BY DWAYNE JANKE
PHOTOGRAPHS BY ALAN HOOD
1940s Writer Arnold Dyck, an immigrant to Canada in the 1920s,
begins to write numerous plays and stories in Plautdietsch with great
artistry—not generally appreciated until after his death in 1970.
18
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
When Pastor Richard Hamm was sent from Ontario to
Alberta in 2001 to start a church outreach to relocated conservative Mennonites there, he began with just an empty building.
He and his wife Elisabeth started the work in Vauxhall alone;
they had no contacts in the agriculture-based community.
But Hamm came with some strong attributes, all offered up
in service to God in a pioneering church planting effort for the
Evangelical Mennonite Mission Conference (EMMC) denomination. He himself has a Mennonite background and a passion
to tell his people what he had personally found in Christ. He
could share in their Plautdietsch language, equipped with the
Plautdietsch Scriptures.
God has used all of this to build a solid foundation for His
church in the southern Alberta town of 1,100. When Pastor
Hamm left Vauxhall EMMC Church last summer for semi1940-44 Stalin relocates 1.5 million Germans (as likely Nazi collaborators), including many
Mennonites, from traditional homeland regions to interior eastern Soviet territory. This begins to
undermine the Germans’ cultural autonomy & assimilates them into Russian culture & language.
Photo Collection, Centre for Mennonite
Brethren Studies, Winnipeg
With a steady influx of their people
from Mexico, evangelical Mennonites
from conservative backgrounds around
Vauxhall, Alberta, reach out using
Plautdietsch Scriptures.
Pastor Richard Hamm (left) and his wife Elisabeth planted the Vauxhall
EMMC Church. Hamm could identify with conservative Mennonites in the
area; he grew up in a Mexico colony, wearing a cowboy hat and overalls like
every other young man, as shown in this old cherished snapshot (below).
He is the one not holding the wagon horse whip.
retirement back in Ontario, the church had a congregation of
nearly 50. A new pastor, Hans Hiebert, who previously ministered in a Kansas church, has joined the group. Since then, he
says, the congregation has grown to 80.
Mennonite Influx
Vauxhall EMMC Church consists mostly of immigrant
Mennonites who have moved into the region by the thousands
over the past few decades, most in search of better livelihoods.
The gentle but persistent friendship evangelism of Hamm,
Hiebert and the flock—who share the good news about Christ
using God’s Word in the centuries-old Mennonite Plautdietsch
mother tongue—is reaching this growing population from
Mexico. (See related “Focus” story, pg. 3.)
Mennonites with a conservative Mennonite background are
increasingly visible around Vauxhall, especially the women
who don long dresses and small head coverings.
On a stroll last summer through this “Potato Capital of the
West”—where mascots “Sammy and Samantha Spud” greet visitors along Highway 36—Hamm stressed that many if not most
homes that are put up for sale in Vauxhall are bought by these
Mennonites. An exception is one home we pass with a “sold”
sign out front and boxes in the living room, visible through a
curtain-less window where a brown cat peers outside.
“They’re not Mennonites,” Hamm said, grinning.
“Mennonites wouldn’t have a cat in the house.”
Housecat-lovers aside, Mennonites have relocated in such
numbers that they have their own overflowing conservative
church, special classroom help in the local public school, and
vocational training and English courses offered by an area college.
“More and more come every year,” recounts Hamm.
Arriving with a farming background from their Mexico colonies, many of the newcomers work as farmhands, employees
in potato processing and packing plants, feedlot labourers, or
the like. Some eventually buy farmland, or start businesses as
carpenters, welders and landscapers.
1945-47 “The Great Trek”: The retreating German army from Russia
takes many Mennonites seeking refuge (left). Two-thirds are forced
back to Russia. 12,000 remain in Western Europe—8,000 Mennonites
come to Canada post-WWII; another 4,600 go to Paraguay by 1954, &
1,000+ to Uruguay.
~1945 Mennonites whose ancestors did not
leave Prussia 500 years ago, flee or are expelled
from the region—Plautdietsch disappears in
this, its homeland.
“I said to one of them, ‘How about it? Are
you ready [for heaven]?’ He said, ‘Is that
possible—that a person can know?’ ”
The bedrock of Hamm’s ministry in Vauxhall,
before he semi-retired in Ontario last summer,
was taking a genuine interest in newly arrived
Mennonites. He helped them practically and
struck up conversations in Plautdietsch, like
those during mid-morning coffee breaks at
the local roadside café.
1948 Wanting to save their children from perceived growing worldliness,
2,000 conservative descendants of the 1870s Mennonite settlers to
Canada migrate to Paraguay to create more colonies.
20
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
—Pastor Richard Hamm, recalling his
visit to one of the first conservative
Mennonites who came to Christ
1950s/early 1960s 80 families of restless Paraguayan
Mennonites migrate to Bolivia’s Santa Cruz province,
later joined by Mennonites from Canada & Mexico.
1953 West Germany’s constitution allows ethnic
Germans (including those in U.S.S.R.) to be accepted
as immigrants, entitled to citizenship.
After the Sunday service, the folks at the Vauxhall
church gather for a monthly potluck (see Focus,
pg. 3). They stay long into the afternoon, many
talking Plautdietsch, laughing and playing card
games. Some produce little piles of shells as they
nibble on sunflower seeds, a favourite snack. “How
do you get 10 Mennonites in a Volkswagen?” one
quips. “Throw a bag of sunflower seeds into it!”
New Life, New Faith
As they start a new life in Canada, some conservative
Mennonites are also open to considering a new, living faith, to
replace the often strict, traditional beliefs that have come with
them from Mexico. But this has to be introduced carefully.
For Pastor Hamm, it always meant simply and genuinely
befriending any Mennonites he could—whether by greeting
them on the street, sitting with them during the daily morning
coffee break at local coffee shops, or helping them with practical translation needs around town.
The early breakthroughs came when Hamm gently confronted two older hospitalized and dying Mennonite men about
their spiritual lives.
“I said to one of them, ‘How about it? Are you ready [for
heaven]?’ He said, ‘Is that possible—that a person can know?’ ”
Mennonite Reborn
Speaking in Plautdietsch, Hamm told the friend his own story.
Hamm had searched all his own life in a Mexico colony for
“something more” beyond the church leader-enforced rules
of that time, like wearing only certain clothing or using steel
wheels on tractors.
Hamm was drinking heavily.
“I was one of the bad guys—always—and for me there was
nothing left but hell. That’s what I always heard.”
To try and escape his problems, Hamm, his reluctant wife
and five kids, migrated to Ontario in 1966. There he heard and
responded to the gospel for the first time at evening outreach
services for area conservative Mennonites. (His wife came to
Christ six months later.)
Hamm was rejected by many of his Mennonite friends in
Canada; some even physically threatened him, attempting to
turn Hamm back from his new beliefs.
1955 U.S.S.R.’s restrictions against free movement are
softened, allowing better living conditions for German
Russians. 1.4 million, including Mennonites, emigrate
to West Germany by 1987.
“But I said, ‘It doesn’t matter if I don’t have any friends. I
know that I have one Friend, and that’s the one that I had been
looking for all my life,’ and that satisfied me.”
Hamm became a completely different person, stopped his
drinking and began sharing his faith. He eventually went on to
be an EMMC pastor to Mennonites in Mexico, before coming
to Vauxhall.
God used Hamm’s testimony to touch his friend in hospital.
“He made a commitment to the Lord, and he was so
happy—so happy,” recalls Hamm. “Before that, he discouraged
his family to come to our church. But then he had the whole
family come to our church. And then he died.”
The other dying man also received Christ and told Hamm
to look after his extended family, which he directed to join the
tiny Vauxhall EMMC church.
So began the initial core of the new church that Hamm
came to pastor. It has been slow, hard work to see it grow.
“We used to live on hope and on
tradition. And in the end, we hoped
everything would turn out for the best.”
—Elisabeth Hamm, on her former
conservative Mennonite beliefs
1957 Two decades after Soviet Germans were last taught their language in
school, most of the younger generation is illiterate in German and many can
barely speak/understand their own dialect. Soviet government encourages
instruction in the mother tongue, but little progress is made.
1959 A national census in U.S.S.R. shows 1.62
million people of German origin, including
Mennonites; 75% say their mother tongue is
German; 60% live in rural areas.
While the fields are soaked with rain, David Reimer—one of the Vauxhall
EMMC Church lay leaders and a hired hand on an area farm—starts his
work week by doing some machinery maintenance. Before coming to
Canada from a Mennonite colony in Mexico, he and his young family had
the privilege of hearing Scriptures in freshly translated Plautdietsch from
Ed Zacharias, their EMMC pastor there. Zacharias translated God’s Word
with the help of Wycliffe consultants (see timeline, pg. 26). “We really
liked it. It was good,” says Reimer. Find out more about the Reimer family’s quest to find a new life in Canada at <www.wycliffe.ca/wordalive>.
God’s Language?
Hamm says many conservative Mennonites simply don’t
understand the often-good sermons that are read to them in
High German. However, they would never allow use of the
Plautdietsch Bible in their churches.
Salvation is not clearly explained, either, Hamm says. Yet,
many of the Mennonites are resistant to hearing anything else,
limited by a lack of education and firmly bent on tradition.
“They say, ‘We don’t have to question the preachers about
anything. What they say, we believe, and if they don’t tell us
the right thing, that will be their responsibility. . . . Hopefully,
we will be saved in the end.’ ”
Adds Elisabeth, “We used to live on hope and on tradition. And
in the end, we hoped everything would turn out for the best.”
Others come to Canada and simply stop attending church
altogether.
So Plain
Vauxhall EMMC Church has embraced the Plautdietsch Bible
for some of its outreach, and uses Plautdietsch in services and
meetings, along with English.
1964 German minorities in Russia are
officially cleared of the WWII allegation
that they were Nazi collaborators.
22
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
1970 U.S.S.R. census shows only 66% of people of German origin say their mother
tongue is German. Mennonites no longer exist as a group with organized churches.
Most meet quietly for prayer and Bible study, led by older laymen.
1972 Residence restrictions are
lifted/immigration possibilities are
enhanced for Soviet Germans.
“The Plautdietsch Bible is very helpful,” says Hamm. “People
say, ‘I never knew that’s what the Bible says.’ It sounds so plain,
you know.”
In Sunday services, Hiebert, who is currently the pastor, has chosen to translate from English Bible versions into
Plautdietsch, noting some differences between the dialect used
in De Bibel and that spoken by people in his church.
However, he says, “when I go to people that are not from
our church, or people that I know understand Plautdietsch
better, I take the Plautdietsch Bible.”
Hiebert says these Mennonites vary in how tightly they
hold to traditions and usually lack spiritual training. Most are
not ready to embrace the translated Scriptures, because ironically they would then understand God’s Word too clearly. For
many, they would then feel more responsible for their failures
in living up to what they read. As well, church leaders would
feel their authority is threatened if their congregants knew the
Scriptures too well.
Still, the pastor says there is plenty of potential for the
relatively new Bible to touch the hearts of conservative
Mennonites. “They are getting more hungry to see what else is
available.”
Abe Klassen, who moved from Ontario with his wife Anna
several years ago to help with the Vauxhall outreach, also sees
the use of Plautdietsch as key.
“That’s what draws the younger generation as well as the
older,” says the soft-spoken Klassen. “Now we can understand
[the Bible] in the language that we speak. It has been a very big
blessing that we can actually preach the language that we speak.”
Key words in the High German that conservative
Mennonites hear in church are usually “too big and too complicated,” he adds.
Klassen, who was born in a Mexico colony before coming to
Canada with his parents in 1989, knows this first hand.
“The background that I come from is these colonies,” says
the 29-year-old carpenter, whose spiritual hunger led him
to the EMMC and Bible college courses. “My heart goes out
towards the people.”
Patient Outreach
Klassen says he tries to gently interact with Mennonites,
especially young couples. He gradually asks them spiritual
questions they can answer from their own experience, and
responds when they begin probing him.
The outreach requires patience. “It all depends on the family. We have some families that we’ve got together with for
over a year and we still won’t talk about Scripture [from the
Plautdietsch Bibel]. You just know that it’s not the right timing.
“Our goal is to be friends, to love them, and that there
wouldn’t be a barrier between us and them,” explains Klassen.
“We’re all basically from the same background. We worship
the same God.”
And at this little church on the prairie, more and more
Mennonites are coming to personally know that same God
and the eternal life He offers.
The Lord’s Prayer
in Plautdietsch
Ons Voda em Himmel!
Dien Nomen saul heilich jehoolen woaren.
Lot dien Rikj komen.
Lot dien Wellen oppe leed jrod soo
jedonn woaren aus em Himmel.
Jeff ons daut Broot daut wi vondoag brucken.
Vejeff ons onse Schult, soo aus wie dee vejäwen,
dee sikj aun ons veschulcht haben.
Brinj ons nich en Vesieekjunk,
oba bewoa ons fa dän beesen.
Wiels die jehieet daut Rikj un de Krauft
un de Harlichkjeit fa emma un emma. Amen.
“ The Plautdietsch Bible is very
helpful. People say, ‘I never knew
that’s what the Bible says.’ It
sounds so plain, you know.”
—Pastor Richard Hamm
—Taken from Matt. 6:9-13, De Bibel
1977/1984 Two Plautdietsch dictionaries
are published, promoting Plautdietsch as
a literary language.
1980s There’s avid interest in Plautdietsch stage performances by
Landmark Theatre Group in southern Manitoba. Studies of Mexican
Mennonites show they regard their spoken Plautdietsch as inferior,
not writeable, lacking culture.
1982 Low German scholars/writers & linguists from Wycliffe
Bible Translators and Canadian Bible Society meet to devise a
standardized spelling system for the Plautdietsch Scriptures.
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca 23
germany
After a Saturday afternoon break to feast on coffee and “zwie-
BY DWAYNE JANKE
PHOTOGRAPHS BY ALAN HOOD
Courtesy of Peter Fast
1986 A study shows that about half
of Canadian Mennonites have retained
High and/or Low German skills.
bach” (a two-part bun familiar to Mennonites), we stand in a
parking lot in Oerlinghausen, Germany, visiting with Wilhelm
Berg (above).
Behind us is “Berg Automobile,” opened in 1999. The
mechanic’s shop is housed in a silver-coloured metal building
with large windows and multiple bays, one of which contains a
car that Berg’s son is servicing.
Beside it, the family is building a huge house, which will also
have room for Berg’s parents. It is clad with grey ornamental
bricks, a distinguishing feature of the new homes built by the
1987 Plautdietsch New Testament (Daut Niehe Tastament)
is published, translated by J.J. Neufeld (left, foreground),
a Manitoba Plautdietsch radio preacher, with help from
Wycliffe Canada’s Peter Fast (left, background) .
Late 1980s Reforms in the Soviet Union open the way for rapidly
increasing numbers of Germans (200,000+ annually), including those
with Mennonite heritage, to emigrate to Germany.
Peter Fast
As Mennonite Germans from Russia,
the Berg family made the challenging
and life-changing choice to start a
new life in Germany. They have
lots of company.
tens of thousands of Russian Mennonite immigrants who have
come to Germany in recent decades.
Berg wants us to understand that it has taken plenty of hard
work to attain all this in Germany. Tugging at his chest pocket,
he says he has lived most of his life here in overalls. But it has
all been worth it.
“I have the feeling that God is blessing me,” he says, speaking through translator Peter Wiens.
Wiens is part-time director of the Plautdietsch Friends
Society, a non-profit organization that fosters and promotes
the Mennonite mother tongue. He is our guide for a whirlwind
weekend tour of all things Mennonite in this region southwest
More on the Web To learn more about of Hannover, before he flies off
to Rome to help a film company
the Plautdietsch Friends Society, visit
<www.plautdietsch-freunde.de/> preparing a TV special on the
(all in Plautdietsch).
Mexican Mennonites.
No Regrets
Berg left Kazakhstan, the former Soviet republic in Central
Asia, for Germany in 1988, with his wife Helen and four
children. They came with nothing but four suitcases.
He worked for 10 years in a company that adjusts iron-cutting machines, before building and starting his mechanic’s business in 1990. He began constructing the new house in the same
year. In the beginning, Wilhelm says, he worked 18-hour days.
Berg left Russia ultimately for economic reasons, though he
himself was included in the tiny segment of the population
who were well off. He was a truck driver, travelling 6,000 km at
a stretch, and earning many times the salary of most workers.
Some of Berg’s relatives were against his family leaving for
Germany, calling him a fascist. Ironically, many of those same
people didn’t want to be left behind and now are also living in
Germany.
“I don’t regret coming here,” Berg says of his family’s new
life. “My children have a future here.”
But why choose Germany?
“We came home.”
for Prussia and eventually Russia (see timeline).
But Mennonites started viewing Germany as their homeland, Wiens explains, when they were treated as Nazi sympathizers and enemies of the U.S.S.R. during World War II.
It didn’t help that Mennonites spoke Plautdietsch at home (a
language considered to be a form of Low German) and High
German in churches and schools.
Not Without Challenges
Mennonites from Russia have flocked here, likely attracted
by the fact that some of their co-religionists from Prussia had
already settled in the area after World War II. But it hasn’t
been without its challenges, even with resettlement aid like
German language classes, given to them by the government.
The newcomers have not always found Germany to be
“home.” Wiens says many were viewed as Germans in Russia;
now, many feel like they are being viewed as Russians in
Germany.
“The language problem is probably the biggest issue in the
beginning,” explains Wiens, “because language is key to all the
other resources here in Germany.”
Wiens says most of the Mennonites who arrived in the
1970s, largely because of religious reasons (see timeline), were
very competent in High German, though they had added
some of their own unique twists and accents to the language.
Those who came in the ’90s were different, however; they
spoke Russian and Plautdietsch.
“Maybe more than half of them didn’t know any High
German, or just a few words, so they needed to learn German
from zero.”
In the Berg family’s case, the family spoke Plautdietsch when
they arrived from Russia. However, the children were getting
mixed up trying to juggle their mother tongue and some
Russian, with the High German all around them. Though Berg
would have been happy to stick with Plautdietsch, he says all
of the family has focused on using High German. They realize
it is the standard in their new homeland.
Back to the Fatherland
Berg has plenty of company. About 2.5 million ethnic
Germans, including 200,000 with Mennonite, Plautdietschspeaking roots, have relocated here. They’ve taken advantage of Germany’s constitutional policy that allowed ethnic
Germans to flood into this new homeland. The immigration
spiked at 200,000 annually during the ’90s, before restrictions
were tightened to stem the huge influx.
Ironically, most Mennonites from Russia generally did not
originate from Germany, but Holland. And those that did
come from northern Germany, left more than 400 years ago,
”I don’t regret coming here.
My children have a future here.”
—Wilhelm Berg, on his family’s decision
to move to Germany from Russia
1988 The Mennonite “Old Colony” population in
Mexico (left) stands at 40,000, despite emigration to
Belize (1958), Bolivia (late ’50s/early ’60s), Paraguay
(1972), Argentina (1986), and the U.S. and Canada.
1989 The last Soviet census shows only
49% of ethnic Germans list German as
their primary language.
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca 25
In recent decades, tens of thousands of Russian Mennonites have flocked to
the city of Bielefeld (shown here) and surrounding towns, located southwest
of Hannover, Germany. They are among some 200,000 immigrants with
Plautdietsch-language roots to arrive in the country to start life anew.
Plautdietsch on Air
High German may be the official language in Germany, but
Plautdietsch is still important for many of its relocated speakers. So is the translation of the Scriptures, which involved
Wycliffe personnel (see timeline, pgs. 24, 26).
Viktor Sawatzki heads production of the regular Plautdietsch
Radio program in the region. While most of the audience is
50 years of age and older, he has heard of groups of 20 young
people gathering in parking lots, opening their car doors to
listen to the Plautdietsch radio show through their auto stereo
systems. The Christian program includes Scripture reading
from the Plautdietsch (“Low German”) Bible.
“It just makes sense that if you talk about God that you read
the Bible in that same language,” explains Sawatzki. “We don’t
want to go back the way it used to be—that we read the Bible
in High German, and then we talk about it in Low German and
then go back again to read it in High German. It’s more natural
to read in Low German.”
Sawatzki doesn’t accept the idea (held by some that spoke
to Word Alive in Germany) that the resettled Mennonites can
completely understand the High German used in their new
More on the Web Some people discouraged churches, thereby getting the
spiritual food they need.
Viktor Sawatzki from serving in Plautdietsch
Radio, but he listened to God instead. Read about “These people exist, but
his story at <www.wycliffe.ca/wordalive>. they are an exception. People
1993/1999 Germany tightens rules to limit the migration flow of
ethnic Germans into the nation, requiring them to prove they use and
have a basis of the German language, culture and upbringing.
26
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
who say they don’t need Low German are in the minority,” he
insists. “But they speak louder and it appears that everybody
thinks that way.”
Few question Sawatzki’s assertion that having the Bible
in Plautdietsch “enriches the language.” He likes the way
Plautdietsch writer Anna Driediger puts it in her published book
of poems: “Nü es de Bibel äwasat, Doamet uck onse Sproak
jeraht.” (“Now that the Bible is translated, our language is saved.”)
No Money, Nothing
Some of the immigrant Russian Mennonites came to Germany
from villages in Russia, where they were farmers; others
migrated from cities, where they laboured in office jobs. In
Germany, the immigrants have found jobs in such places as
big appliance factories and car assembly plants. They gradually
earn enough money to buy a car, a house and more education,
for them and their children.
“They come with no money, with nothing,” adds Wiens.
“But they are industrious. They don’t mind working hard. And
they have vision—they want to build a new life, they want to
create a good basis for their children. And they’re not afraid to
take out big loans from the bank. Their German neighbours
wouldn’t do that, but they [Mennonites] are not really scared to
pay it off in 30 years.”
Overall, the children are adapting more quickly to German
1992 An estimated two-thirds of the 90,000 people of Mennonite
extraction, who immigrated to Germany from the former Soviet
Union since the 1980s, speak only Plautdietsch.
1996 Working in Mexico, Ed Zacharias begins translating the
Old Testament into Plautdietsch. Wycliffe’s David Henne &
Viola Reimer Stewart serve as translation consultants. The
group “Friends of Plautdietsch” supports the work.
life, though they have their struggles too, says Wiens. “And the
parents, they probably will never totally adapt.”
We get a hint of this by dropping in at the private AugustHermann-Francke School in Detmold, an impressive campus
built by 70 Russian Mennonite parents on a former British military base. Staffed by Christian teachers and operated in High
German, the school is attended by 1,400 children in grades 1-13.
Hands Up for Plautdietsch
In one classroom, we ask how many students speak Plautdietsch.
A half dozen raise their hands (though Edward Thun, the
school’s secretary, says most use the language at home).
How about their parents? Virtually every pupil in the classroom raises their hands.
Wiens notes that when he supervised bus pick-ups at the
school, he overheard many students speaking the mother tongue. When he walked by, they switched to High German, and
then back again to Plautdietsch as he moved farther away.
These youngsters are definitely straddling two worlds, but
their weight is shifted much more towards the German one.
Many parents, however, are trying to keep one foot set
firmly back in their previous homeland. This is evidenced by
a chain of close to 50 “Mix Markt” stores selling products that
cater to Russian-German immigrants, including Mennonites.
In these stores, aisles are filled with Russian CDs and books;
three types of sunflower seeds in huge bulk bins; vodka, beer
and wine; matroska dolls; dozens of varieties of candy; even
instant bottled borscht—all imported from Russia.
At the door, you can also grab an issue of the weekly
“Heimat” (Home) newspaper in Russian. I wonder out loud:
What would German Russians say “Heimat” means—Germany
or Russia?
“Officially, they say Germany,” explains Wiens, “but what
they feel is Russia.”
Peter Wiens, director of the Plautdietsch Friends Society, gets the details
about instant bottled borscht soup from a saleswoman at “Mix Markt.”
It is one of nearly 50 stores in Germany catering to Russian-German
immigrants (including Mennonites) by selling products from Russia.
Liberal-Conservative Spectrum
What the immigrants think about faith is more varied. Of
the estimated 200 Russian Mennonite churches in Germany,
Wiens says there are probably up to 50 different groups, from
“quite liberal to very conservative, and everything in between.”
“The Russian-German Mennonites who are organized in
more conservative churches, they don’t adjust quickly. They
have their own world, and they have tougher, stronger rules,
so even their clothes will be different.”
This is particularly evident with the women, who wear head
coverings and have their hair in a bun, wear no slacks, no earrings or cosmetics. Social rules exclude dancing, and visits to
the theatre and the cinema. Some of their children may go to
public schools but insist on exemptions when evolution and
“ They come with no money, with
nothing. But they are industrious.”
—Peter Wiens, on Russian Mennonites
who emigrate to Germany
2003 Translation of the Plautdietsch Old/New Testaments is published together as
De Bibel, by United Bible Societies & Kindred Productions, a Mennonite publishing
house. Copies of the 5,000 print run sell immediately & are delivered to Mexico,
Germany and Paraguay.
2004 In the past 3 decades, 50,000 Plautdietsch-speaking
Mennonites of Canadian descent have emigrated from
Latin America back to Canada.
sex education are taught.
Many immigrants with a Mennonite background don’t consider
themselves Mennonites anymore, ending up attending new Baptist
or other evangelical churches they are starting in Germany.
“Because . . . of people living scattered all over the Soviet
Union, not really living together and building up their own
identity, all the knowledge about their heritage and the history,
who they are—it just got lost,” explains Wiens.
More than half of the Plautdietsch-speaking population
aren’t even believers, estimates Wiens. “That’s what war and
the communist times brought.”
Tragic History
I get a summary of this tragic history from Dr. Katherine
Neufeld, curator of the Museum for Russian-German Culture,
which focuses on Mennonites. It is located on the grounds of
the August-Hermann-Francke School.
From the 1920s through the Stalin era, efforts were made
to assimilate Mennonites, Neufeld explains. Then in the ’30s,
oppression intensified. Bibles could not be printed, bought or
(Below) At the Bielefeld Mennonite Church’s Sunday service, men and women sit
on opposite sides of the main floor pews, while teens and younger folks fill the
balcony. Most who attend the church, started in the ’70s, have a Russian-Mennonite
background. The congregation has started seven other churches to reach out to
similar new immigrants in the area, the majority of whom aren’t believers.
(Above) Plautdietsch speakers swarm around the sales table of the Plautdietsch
Friends Society, after a Sunday afternoon church service in the Low German
language at Lage, Germany. It was sponsored by the non-profit group. Books,
music CDs and De Bibel are prominent items, as well as information about
Plautdietsch radio ministries broadcasting to the area.
Alan Hood
Currently Since the late 1980s, 2 million+ ethnic Germans from the former Soviet Union (like
those at left) have migrated to Germany. About 200,000 have Russian Mennonite (Plautdietsch)
backgrounds; half of these are Christians, an estimated 70%+ speak Plautdietsch (but most
don’t see themselves as Mennonites).
sold. Many Mennonites were deported—first the church leaders
and rich landowners—often to Siberia. The German press was
shut down. When Hitler took power, the Russian government
viewed Germans in their nation as suspect. Mennonite German
schools were closed, as well as 120 of their churches. When
World War II started, Russian anger against Germany was projected onto the ethnic Germans, who were seen as enemies.
Genocide began. Their story was even removed from all Russian
encyclopedias in the country. Many Mennonites were relocated
during these times in Russia—to Siberia, Kazakhstan and the
Ural Mountains. These areas have been the source of most of the
immigrants to Germany.
One of the things that wasn’t repressed or forbidden among
the beleaguered Mennonites was speaking their beloved
Plautdietsch language at home, Neufeld explains. The language
has been important for Mennonites.
“I regard it as the vehicle for the culture and for their religious
beliefs, as a strategy to survive,” says Neufeld.
Surviving with Faith
After a Sunday service at Bielefeld Mennonite Church, and
before a hearty lasagna lunch made by his wife, Pastor Herman
Heidebrecht talks about life for Mennonites in the old Soviet
homeland. He says that it was difficult to maintain their faith.
“The Christian beliefs, the Christian faith, was only passed on
to the next generation by the old women and grandmothers,” says
Heidebrecht, “because all the men and the leaders of the church
were either taken away or killed.”
I ask the pastor if he thinks it was unfortunate for the Russian
Mennonites that it took so long to have a Plautdietsch Bible
translated. Couldn’t it have helped them?
Heidebrecht, whose own family suffered deportation to
Siberia, says the issue was not simply the translation.
“Back then, they were so happy only to have a Bible—in
German, Russian, or even the Old German style.”
With many ethnic, non-religious Mennonites coming to
Germany, churches like his need to reach out, ideally equipped
by knowing their language and mentality. His denomination
does so through large evangelism events, like a stadium rally
attended by 5,000 people each night for 10 days every fall.
“Through personal contacts, many people are joining the
churches, too. They become born again and they get baptized.”
People who migrate to Germany often come to realize that the
materialism that helped draw them will not satisfy in the long run.
“I think of Jesus’ words that ‘men do not live by bread alone.’
People have everything they need physically, but they are looking
for more—they need more.”
Mennonites number 1 million+ adults in 60 countries. 400,000+ speak Plautdietsch,
mostly in Americas (80,000 in Canada), the former Soviet Union & Germany. The
Plautdietsch language & Bible are increasingly used in various outreach ministries.
Virtually every student in this classroom at the private August-Hermann-Francke
School in Detmold, Germany, raises his or her hand in response to the question:
“How many of your parents speak Plautdietsch?” .
Beyond Germany
Heidebrecht says village churches in some parts of Russia held
church services in Plautdietsch. And while some congregations
in his area carry on the tradition by including a Plautdietsch
service, his church doesn’t. About 20 per cent of the congregation just wouldn’t understand it.
But Plautdietsch is still important to the pastor, because
Heidebrecht’s vision goes beyond his church, and even Germany.
His congregation has collected clothes to ship to Bolivia, where
economic conditions and drought have caused suffering among
many colony Mennonites (see related story, pg. 4). He has also
travelled to that South American country to teach and preach
among Mennonites who have left the colony tradition there. He
did it all in the Plautdietsch language.
“It’s much more effective to speak Plautdietsch. Then we are
sure that they understand.”
In the end, surely this is the important thing: whether you
are a Mennonite in Russia, Germany, Canada or Bolivia, it is
crucial to understand who God is and how much He personally
wants to relate—to all of us.
“It just makes sense that if you talk
about God that you read the Bible
in that same language.”
—Viktor Sawatzki, head of the
Radio Plautdietsch team
Main sources: Mennonite Historical Society of Canada (www.mhsc.ca/); The Story of Low German
& Plautdietsch (Reuben Epp); From Catherine to Khrushchev: The Story of Russia’s Germans (Adam
Giesinger); Mennonite Historical Atlas (William Schroeder, Helmut T. Huebert); Ethnologue – 15th
Edition (SIL, Raymond G. Gordon, Jr.)
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca 29
A three-day memorial service was held
50th Anniversary
in January on Palm Beach in Ecuador, where
(Waw-oh-DAWN-ee) tribesmen in
of Five Missionary Waodani
Ecuador murdered five American missionaries
Deaths Remembered 50 years ago.
More than 200 Waodani and visitors participated, including representatives from Wycliffe
and Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF), as well as relatives of the slain young men. Ten
Waodani were baptized at the event.
The missionaries attempted to make contact with the remote and violent Waodani tribe
in January 1956. An initial friendly contact turned violent several days later, resulting in the
spearing deaths of Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, Ed McCully, Pete Fleming and Roger Youderian.
Following the killings, Elizabeth Eilliot and Wycliffe’s Rachel Saint (relatives of the slain
men) returned to the Waodani to bring them the gospel and begin translating God’s Word.
After only a few years, the Waodani’s high inter-tribal homicide rate was virtually eliminated.
Today, several of the killers are elders in the Waodani church (below).
The Waodani story, which inspired one of the great movements into ministry and missions in church history, had a strong Wycliffe connection besides Rachel Saint: Rosi Jung and
Dr. Catherine Peeke (translation of the Scriptures, including the New Testament, published in
1992); Jim Yost (anthropological studies) and Pat Kelley (literacy). Peeke continues to work on
a Waodani-Spanish bilingual dictionary.
See reply form ad and/or our Web site to purchase a new book telling the Waodani story.
Celebrating
Three Significant
Anniversaries
Three Wycliffe-related organizations in Peru, Papua New Guinea
(PNG) and India are celebrating
important anniversaries in 2006.
In September, SIL’s Peru Branch
will mark 60 years of work in the South American country, where 10 million people
speak more than 70 languages. Since William Cameron Townsend began the work in
Peru in 1946, SIL has served in 70 Peruvian languages, completing 40 New Testaments.
SIL’s contract to do language work in Peru expires in 2010.
SIL’s work in PNG is also marking a significant anniversary—50 years—with an
all-day celebration scheduled for April 21, 2006. SIL PNG was founded in 1956 after
Canadian Wycliffe member Jim Dean was asked to go to PNG to “see what the Lord had
for SIL there.” Since the dedication of the first New Testament in 1974, a total of 159 New
Testaments and one complete Bible have been dedicated. The PNG government recently
issued six commemorative postage stamps celebrating SIL’s 50 years of work, including
one with an image of Jim Dean (above).
In India, more than 60 Word for All (WFA) translators, literacy workers and survey
teams celebrated WFA’s 25th anniversary in January. WFA is in the process of becoming a
Wycliffe member organization.
Formerly known as the Indian Institute for Cross Cultural Communication (IICCC), WFA
oversees more than 50 translation and literacy projects in India. WFA personnel have
completed a number of New Testaments, including five that were dedicated in January.
SIL Materials Help Fight Avian Flu
Dave Crough
SIL literacy workers and medical professionals in Asia have created and published
a booklet, poster, and leaflet to inform ethnic communities about the feared Avian Flu
pandemic.
This life-saving information, describing the risk and prevention of the flu (H5N1), is in
story form for anyone to translate into another language. An audio version is also available.
SIL Linguist Successfully Proposes New Symbol
An SIL linguist has convinced a major world body to add a new symbol to the International
Phonetic Alphabet, the first addition in 12 years.
Dr. Kenneth Olson, SIL’s associate international linguistics coordinator, proposed a new
“labiodental flap” symbol (left), giving linguists and Bible
translators an agreed-upon standard for writing this sound when
doing phonetic transcription.
The council of the International Phonetic Association approved
adoption of the symbol, which represents a speech sound found in over
70 languages in central and southeastern Africa.
Olson encountered this sound when he was living among the Mono
people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The labiodental flap is produced by drawing
the lower lip back into the mouth well behind the upper teeth and then bringing it forward
rapidly, striking the upper teeth briefly in passing.
Translation
Degree
Launched
in Nigeria
30
A new bachelor of arts translation degree program has been
launched by the Theological
College of Northern Nigeria to train
Africans for Bible translation. Dr.
David Crozier, a Wycliffe member,
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca
Ethnic communities without Internet access to flu information are at high risk and
need the information in a language they can understand in order to take preventative
action. The producers hope these materials will be effective in educating communities
that would otherwise be unaware of the potential dangers, which could cost the lives of
millions of wild and domestic birds and possibly spread among humans.
For free downloads in several languages, visit <www.sil.org/literacy>.
is serving as head of the college’s
Bible translation department.
The courses being offered are
a direct outcome of the PABTEN
(Partnership for Bible Translation
and Evangelism in Nigeria) coali-
tion thrust. Bob Lever, a Wycliffe
Canada member, has been heavily
involved in encouraging PABTEN’s
development.
Three students are currently
enrolled for the BA and six have
been accepted for next year, plus
five for an MA program starting
at the same time. School officials
hope that some will come from
other African countries in the
future.
The New Face
of Missions
O
One of my favourite Bible verses is Zephaniah 3:17. In this
verse, the prophet declares that God Himself takes great
delight in His children. It also says that the Lord rejoices over
us “with singing.” How awesome is that?
I am convinced there is a time when we best know, in our
hearts, that God is rejoicing over us. It is when He allows
us to reflect our joy back to Him over what He is doing in
the world. God gave me an opportunity to do just that on a
recent trip to Peru.
I was able to attend “Partners Day” at the SIL Peru Branch
Conference. The work of SIL, Wycliffe’s partner organization
on the field, is celebrating 60 years of ministry in Peru in
2006. In the next four to five years, SIL’s work there will draw
to a close. This will release many who have years of experience and expertise to help with the world’s remaining 2,500
languages still needing translation. In his report, Director
Jim Roberts used the illustration of a runner in a relay race
passing the baton on to the next teammate. The Peru Church,
including the Church among the many indigenous people
groups, is poised and ready to accept the challenge of the race
that lies ahead. It is time to pass the baton.
During the day we divided into small groups consisting of
western missionaries and Peruvian mission leaders, including those from Quechua and other people groups. At one
point we were asked the question, “Whose responsibility is it
BY DAVE
OHLSON
to translate the Bible?” Out of that discussion came statements
that reflect the heart and passion of the Church in Peru:
1. Jesus Christ is the head of the Church and He is the architect
for its growth (Matthew 16:18, 28:19-20; Ephesians 5:23).
2. It is the work of the entire worldwide Church of Jesus Christ
to provide God’s Word for all peoples, in every generation,
until He returns (Philippians 2:16, Isaiah 55:11).
3. The primary building block of the Church anywhere in the
world is the Word of God in the heart language (Hebrews
4:12; Revelation 5:9, 7:9).
4. We who make up the Church are empowered by the Holy Spirit
and sent out with the gifts of the Spirit to be used of Christ in
the building of God’s Kingdom (Acts 1:8; Ephesians 4:12).
5. The Church, composed of those from every tribe, language,
people and nation, will one day be presented to Christ as the
perfect bride (Ephesians 5:25-27).
These statements are a perfect reflection of why organizations
like Wycliffe Bible Translators of Canada must increasingly
partner with the whole Church worldwide.
In 1999 Wycliffe International adopted Vision 2025. This
vision aims to see a Bible translation project started in every
language group that needs it by the year 2025. This is an
impossible task for any one segment of the Church. However,
with God’s help, and the joining together of the Church
around the world, this generation may well live to see the
vision become a reality.
I can personally attest to the fact that it is happening in
Peru (and around the world) as we combine our hearts and
hands in this great challenge of the Church.
Dave Ohlson served as a translator, with his wife Joan, in the Philippines, before working in various administrative roles in Asia. He is currently executive director of Wycliffe
Bible Translators of Canada.
| Summer 2006 | www.wycliffe.ca 31
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WYCLIFFE BIBLE TRANSLATORS OF CANADA INVITES YOU TO:
W
hen was the last time you met a Christian who has
hunted rhino with a spear? How about an awardwinning singer from Africa? Meet Josiah Ole Kirisuah and
his daughter, Neema Ntalel Kirisuah.
Josiah is a former Maasai warrior from an east African
village. Today, he is a fulltime Christian worker with Wycliffe’s
partner organization, Bible Translation and Literacy (BTL) in
Kenya. Josiah lives the best of his proud African heritage
alongside his first-generation Christian faith.
Tour stops:
Winnipeg, Calgary, Kelowna, Vancouver,
Abbotsford, Toronto, St. John, Fredericton,
Moncton and Sussex.
Neema is Josiah’s eldest child and an award-winning singer.
Recognized as Best Female Vocalist in east Africa at the
2005 Kora Awards, Neema gives all the credit to the Lord!
Josiah and Neema will tour Canada from May 18 to June
11, 2006, as guests of Wycliffe Bible Translators of Canada.
Don’t miss this time of unforgettable music and testimony!
Updated information
and schedule details:
www.wycliffe.ca (click on “Special
Events: Spear and Song”), or call
toll free 1-800-463-1143