Good Library Gallery to display aspects of Hutterite culture March 11-July 13

Exhibit: “Hutterite Life” (on display from March 11 to July 13)

Reception date and time: Sunday, March 11, 2-4 p.m.

Location:The Good Library Gallery

Cost: Free and open to the public.

Event sponsor: The Mennonite-Amish Museum Committee

GOSHEN, Ind. – Various aspects of Hutterite history, faith and culture, from their European beginnings in the 16^th century until their contemporary life in the Canadian and American West, will be on display in the Goshen College Good Library Gallery from March 11 to July 13. There will be a reception on March 11, from 2 to 5 p.m. in the gallery, at which four persons from Hutterite communities will be present and give comments. The exhibit and reception are free and open to the public.

The exhibit will include clothing, implements, folk arts, manuscripts, selected quotations and photographs depicting the culture of the Hutterites, an Anabaptist-related communal group living in the western United States and Canada.

“The reason why they are so important is because they are one of the three Anabaptist groups – the Swiss Brethren, the Menno Simons tradition and the Hutterites – to survive since their beginnings in 1528,” said Leonard Gross, a Mennonite historian and one of the coordinators of the exhibit. “This is a tribute to the Hutterites. We Mennonites need the Amish to remind us what simplicity is all about, and we need the Hutterites to remind us what community can be.”

The Hutterites live in communities that average less than 100 people, and they form new communities when they get too large, according to Gross. There are over 425 Hutterite colonies in North America, which includes 40,000 people.

The religious group maintains a strong Anabaptist identity and beliefs, especially that Christian discipleship is lived out in community and the commitment to an ethic of peace and nonviolence. They live primarily in rural communities, with farming, artisan and manufacturing work.

At the reception on March 11, from 4 to 5 p.m., the head elder of the largest Hutterite community, John Waldner, will be in attendance, along with four other Hutterite members who are coming from Manitoba and the Dakotas.

The exhibit was prepared and interpreted by Gross and Jan Gleysteen, with curator Faye Peterson. The exhibit is sponsored by the Goshen College Mennonite-Amish Museum Committee and dedicated to the memory of Beulah Stauffer Hostetler (1926-2005).

Hostetler was born on July 8, 1926 in Tofield, Alberta, Canada, and came to the United States to attend Hesston (Kan.) College and Goshen College. At the age of 42, she returned to school for a doctorate in religious thought, which she earned from the University of Pennsylvania in 1977. She was the author of “American Mennonites and Protestant Movements: A Community Paradigm” (Herald Press, 1987). She served as assistant professor of sociology at Elizabethtown (Pa.) College and as the associate director of the Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies. An independent researcher and scholar in her own right, Hostetler also supported and collaborated with her husband John A. Hostetler in his research on the Amish, Hutterites and Mennonites.

The Library Gallery, located on the lower level of the Harold and Wilma Good Library on the campus of Goshen College, is open from 7:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday, noon to 6 p.m. Saturday and 1 to 11 p.m. Sunday.

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 four-year 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.