Mennonites in Belize

  At Universal Hardware customers are greeted with smiles and a cheerful "hello"   I hired a Mennonite girl to go shopping with me several months ago. The purpose? To tour the different stores and businesses in the Mennonite community of  Spanish Lookout in order to discover the best customer service in the colony. Actually I did not exactly hire this girl. I persuaded her to join me.   We were not able to visit certain of  the churches since they are only open on Sundays and now and then in the evenings. But...but...churches are not businesses, right?  Right! However if you attended some of these churches you would think otherwise.   So we leisurely wandered in and out of stores, asking random questions and glancing at each other when the dust on the display shelves was so thick we could trace letters with our fingers. In one store items were in decidedly chaotic yet somehow organized mess. Packages were crumpled and labels yellowed and faded. Another...

       Who will be the first to arrive?  was the question on everyone's mind last week as the community of Spanish Lookout officially inaugerated its very own funeral home. Located on Rt 35 West and made of glass and concrete, it is a building that now finally became reality. In the past the bodies were stored in a refrigerated trailer from the until the day of the funeral. Actually, based on the contractor, a few weeks ago he was asked if bodies could already be stored there but he refused because the building wasn't properly finished. Mennonite News View Blog                            A. Mendoza

   Mennonites from Lower Barton Creek are a common sight on the roads of Spanish Lookout   More than 50 years ago their ancestors travelled south from Canada to Mexico then on to Belize, all because of religious freedom. Now certain families are fleeing Belize in the opposite direction: north. Their reason this time: inflation which in their eyes amounts to a form of persecution and oppression. Certainly 99% percent of us Belizeans heartily agree with them on that.   At least 8 families from the small colony of Green Hills in south central Belize have left for southern Mexico where they aim to establish a new colony and discover better economic opportunities. They are tired of the constantly rising cost of goods and the high price of fertile farmland and have become disillusioned with the government.   These Mennonites are an ultra conservative , rigidly traditional sub-sect or branch of the Old Colony "Russian" Mennonites of northern Belize. In dress code they ...

      The following is my experience. The events are written in the order they occurred and to the best of my knowledge without exaggerating. I have not written every single instance I was bullied; some of those moments I cannot quite bring myself to write about even after nearly three decades but for the most part I can write and speak about it with forgiveness in my heart.   A little over twenty-five years ago I began kindergarten classes at a private school operated by a Church of God in Christ, Mennonite congregation but was immediately switched to Grade 1 due to my mother teaching me how to read and write in Spanish and English before I was even 7 years old. The first few weeks I loved it.   Then the bullying began. Despite being a respectable school with kind and friendly teachers and students who were children of baptized church members, it became torture for me during the first two years. Unfortunately even though one or two of the older ones felt sorry ...

     There was no mistaking it for what it was. Cold, brutal, and ruthless with a sugar-coated layer of religious self-righteousness: the coup'd'etat  occurred on a weekend, when the victim was absent. Perhaps it facilitated the overthrow in easing their conscience even though the plot commenced much earlier. For the first time in my life I experienced firsthand a side of these Mennonites I had heard about but never observed up close. I had heard of brothers carrying their brothers to court, I have heard of mediators being called to settle squabbles between siblings over their father's inheritance, of women banning their own sisters from their home due simply to dress code.   It was late afternoon when the instigators rounded up a small group of us senior employees and stated that they had sad news for us. When the shocking news was delivered to us we were stunned. Speechless. Flabbergasted. Incredulous. Later certain of us were outraged and indignant. How could...

  A sunset over Countryside Park The first official gym in Spanish Lookout will soon be open People relax at Mennonite Beach A choir singing at Greendale Mennonite News View Blog                         A. Mendoza