Mennonites talking
Mennonites are talking about Women Talking, Miriam Toews’s latest novel. What are your thoughts? Feel free to comment below or send letters to letters@canadianmennonite.org. Though I am still trying to figure out why the book troubled me—despite my admiration of Toews—some of my thoughts on the book are contained in Part 4 of “Modern ghosts…
Modern ghosts of a horse-drawn scandal, Part 4
Eight men went to prison, the media gaze moved on, and colony life resumed. But the saga of mass rape in the Bolivian corner of our family of faith is far from over. It’s hard not to talk about something as sensational and consequential as a mass rape case on an intensely conservative colony in…
The Ghost Rapes of Bolivia
For a while, the residents of Manitoba Colony thought demons were raping the town’s women. There was no other explanation. No way of explaining how a woman could wake up with blood and semen stains smeared across her sheets and no memory of the previous night. No way of explaining how another went to sleep…
An uncommon welcome
“As part of my probation conditions, I have to stay away from places where there are families,” says Joe Patterson, “so that made finding a church hard.” It didn’t help that when he was released from prison, he stepped into a society primed to fear and revile people like him. Politicians of all parties talk…
Bolivian Mennonite rape trial ends in convictions
Eight members of the Manitoba and Riva Palacios Mennonite colonies accused of raping more than a hundred women and girls were found guilty on Aug. 25 after a two-month trial. A ninth, Jacob Neudorf Enns, escaped from the Palmasola Prison in Santa Cruz some time ago and remains a fugitive. Seven of the accused were…
