The Ontario (Old Order) Mennonite Conference is a moderate

Old Order Mennonite Old Order Mennonites (Pennsylvania Dutch language, Pennsylvania German: ) form a branch of the Mennonite tradition. Old Order Movement, Old Order are those Mennonite groups of Swiss people, Swiss German and south Germans, German heritage who pract ...

group in the

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

province A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''Roman province, provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

, that was formed in 1889 as a reaction to modernizing trends among the Mennonites in Ontario. The members use

horse and buggy ] A horse and buggy (in American English) or horse and carriage (in British English and American English) refers to a light, simple, two-person carriage of the late 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries, drawn usually by one or sometimes by two ho ...

for transportation. As of 2020, they also have a colony in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island.

Name

The Conference is sometimes referred to as ''Old Order Mennonite Church'' (e. g.

Donald Kraybill Donald B. Kraybill (born 1945) is an American author, lecturer, and educator on Anabaptist faiths and culture. Kraybill is widely recognized for his studies on Anabaptist groups and in particular the Amish. He has researched and written extensivel ...

) , whereas the name given above is used by the

Mennonite World Conference The Mennonite World Conference (MWC) is a Mennonite Anabaptist Christian denomination. Its headquarters are in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada. History The first ''Mennonite World Conference'' was held in Basel in 1925. Its main purpose was to celebra ...

and by Stephen Scott . A popular name for the members is ''Woolwich Mennonites'' or just ''Woolwichers'', because Abraham Weber Martin, the bishop who was the main force behind the formation of the group, resided in

Woolwich, Ontario The Township of Woolwich is a rural township in Southwestern Ontario, Canada, considered as a municipality. The Township is located in the northeast part of Waterloo Region and is made up of 10 small communities, with Elmira, Ontario the largest ...

History

Since 1871, when six bishops in Ontario declared there should be no association with bishop Jacob Wisler of Ohio, who was dismissed because of his conservative stance, there were tensions among the Mennonites in Ontario about the question how much modern practices like

Sunday School A Sunday school is an educational institution, usually (but not always) Christian in character. Other religions including Buddhism, Islam, and Judaism have also organised Sunday schools in their temples and mosques, particularly in the West. Su ...

revival meeting A revival meeting is a series of Christian religious services held to inspire active members of a church body to gain new converts and to call sinners to repent. Nineteenth-century Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon said, "Many blessings may come ...

s, English language preaching etc. should be introduced. The final break between the Old Orders and the modernizers occurred in 1889 when there were two different Conferences, because there was a conflict about the date of the conference.

Belief and practice

The members use horse and buggy for transportation. Their stance on technology is quite similar to that of the Groffdale Conference Mennonite Church. The German language is used in worship services, and Pennsylvania German is spoken at home and with members of the own group as well as with other Old Order groups.

Controversy

In November 2020, during the

COVID-19 pandemic in Ontario The COVID-19 pandemic in Ontario is an ongoing viral pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a novel infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first confirmed case of COVID-19 in ...

, both the Region of Waterloo Public Health unit and Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health issued orders to close Old Order schools and places of worship in their regions and to limit social interactions. The orders were issued because of extremely high infection rates. In Waterloo Region, the orders applied to sects "including Markham, Old Colony, and David Martin Mennonite communities", according to a news report. Both agencies cited a lack of cooperation with public health requirements that were intended to minimize the spread of the virus. In an interview with the

Waterloo Region Record The ''Waterloo Region Record'' (formerly ''The Record'') is the daily newspaper covering Waterloo Region, Ontario, Canada, including the cities of Kitchener, Waterloo and Cambridge, as well as the surrounding area. Since December 1998, the ''Re ...

, bishop Peter Brubacher, ("bishop for seven Old Order Mennonite church districts" in north Waterloo Region according to another news agency), made this comment, "I guess to be frank and honest, a lot of people really didn’t take it that serious, to isolate".

Membership

Population and distribution

In 1957 the Old Order Mennonite Conference of Ontario had a membership of 1,061, unbaptized family members not counted. In 1992 there were about 2,200 adult members in 16 congregations. In 2008/9 membership was about 3,200 in 36 congregations. By the year 2018 the population of the community had grown to 6,831 individuals.

Literature

* Donald B. Kraybill and James P. Hurd: ''Horse-and-buggy Mennonites: Hoofbeats of Humility in a Postmodern World''. University Park, PA 2006. * Stephen Scott: ''An Introduction to Old Order and Conservative Mennonite Groups''. Intercourse, PA 1996. *Donald Kraybill: ''Concise Encyclopedia of Amish, Brethren, Hutterites, and Mennonites'', Baltimore 2010.

References

External links

"Old Order Mennonite Groups in Ontario"
at Anabaptistwiki.org
"Moderate Old Order Mennonite Groups"
at Anabaptistwiki.org {{Anabaptists Mennonitism in Ontario Mennonite denominations Religious organizations established in 1889 Old Order Mennonites