The Mennonites in Bolivia are among the most traditional and conservative of all Mennonite denominations in America. They are mostly Russian Mennonites of Frisian, Flemish, and Prussian descent. , there were about 150,000 Mennonites living in Bolivia.
History Origins
In the early-to-mid 16th century, Mennonites began to move from the Low Countries to the Vistula delta region, seeking religious freedom and exemption from military service. There they gradually replaced their Dutch and Frisian languages with the Plautdietsch dialect spoken in the area, blending into it elements of their native tongues. The Mennonites of Dutch origin were joined by Mennonites from other parts of northern Europe.
In 1772, most of Poland Mennonites' land in the Vistula area became part of the Kingdom of Prussia in the first of the Partitions of Poland. Frederick William II of Prussia ascended the throne in 1786 and imposed heavy fees on the Mennonites in exchange for continued military exemption.
Earlier migrations
In the 1760s Catherine the Great of Russia invited Mennonites from Prussia to settle on land and farm north of the Black Sea in what is modern Ukraine, near Zaporizhia, in exchange for religious freedom and exemption from military service, a precondition founded in their commitment to non-violence. The ancestors of the Bolivian Mennonites settled in the Ukrainian section of the Russian Empire in two main waves in the years 1789 and 1804, leaving Danzig and the Polish Vistula delta because they were being annexed by Prussia. After Russia introduced the general conscription in 1874, many Mennonites migrated to the US and Canada.
In the years after 1873 some 11,000 left the Russian Empire and settled in Manitoba, Canada, and an equal number went to Kansas, Nebraska and Dakota territory. The Russian Mennonites settled in Canada until a universal, secular compulsory education was implemented in 1917 that required the use of the English language, which the more conservative Mennonites saw as a threat to the religious basis of their community.
The more conservative Mennonites from Russia, some 6,000 people, left Canada between 1922 and 1925 and settled in Mexico. Another 1,800 more conservative Mennonites migrated to the Chaco region in Paraguay in 1927. In 1930 and in 1947 the Paraguayian Mennonites were joined by Mennonites coming directly from Russia. In the years after 1958 some 1,700 Mennonites from the Mexican settlements moved to what was then British Honduras and today is Belize.
Bolivia The Bolivian government granted a privilege to future Mennonite immigrants including freedom of religion, private schools and exemption from military service in the 1930s, but that was not deployed until the 1950s.
Between 1954 and 1957, a first group of 37 families from various Mennonite colonies in Paraguay established Tres Palmas colony, 25 km northeast of Santa Cruz de la Sierra. Soon, a second colony was established five km away from Tres Palmas by a group of 25 conservative families from Menno Colony in Paraguay. The settlers from Paraguay were experienced and well prepared to practice agriculture in a subtropical climate. In 1959, the total Mennonite population in Bolivia was 189.
In 1963, new settlements were founded where Mennonites from Paraguay and Canada lived together. In 1967, Mennonites from Mexico and from their daughter colonies in Belize began to settle in the Santa Cruz Department. Las Piedras colony, founded 1968, was the first colony founded exclusively by Mennonites from Canada. Most settlers in Bolivia were traditional Mennonites who wanted to separate themselves more from "the world". Altogether there were about 17,500 Mennonites living in 16 colonies in Bolivia by 1986, of whom nearly 15,000 were Old Colony Mennonites and 2,500 Bergthal or Sommerfeld Mennonites.
Colonies and population
In 1995, there were a total of 25 Mennonite colonies in Bolivia with a total population of 28,567. The most populous ones were Riva Palacios (5,488), Swift Current (2,602), Nueva Esperanza (2,455), Valle Esperanza (2,214) and Santa Rita (1,748). In 2002 there were 40 Mennonite colonies with a population of about 38,000 people. An outreach of Conservative Mennonites can be found at La Estrella, with others in progress.
The total population was estimated at 60,000 by Lisa Wiltse in 2010.
In 2012 there were 23,818 church members in congregations of Russian Mennonites, indicating a total population of about 70,000. Another 1,170 Mennonites were in Spanish-speaking congregations. The number of colonies was 57 in 2011.
Martyna Wojciechowska, a Polish journalist, created a TV documentary about the colony in Santa Rita, as a part of her TV programme Kobieta na krańcu świata, that aired on Polish TV on 1 October 2017. A 2020 survey found that there are more than 200 Mennonite colonies in nine Iberian American countries, with 99 in Bolivia.
The latest census in Bolivia (2024) counted 75,852 German-speaking people (aged 4 and over), though, evasion from participating in government censuses is high within the community. Over 90% of them were living in the Santa Cruz Department, primarily in the provinces of Chiquitos, where 33,299 German-speaking people were counted (32.7% of province's population), Cordillera with 16,138 people (13.2% of population), Velasco with 6,214 people (7.6%), Ñuflo de Chávez with 8,057 (6.8%), German Busch with 1,395 people (3.5%) and Guarayos with 1,507 (2.8%). At the same time, 2,903 people (around 2%) German-speaking people (aged 4 and over) were counted in the Gran Chaco Province of the Tarija Department and 1,280 (1%) in the Cercado Province of the Beni Department.
There were more than 8,000 Mennonites in free communities.
Name Established Origin Population in 1997 Populationin 2007 Tres Palmas 1954 Paraguay - - Canadiense 1 1957 Paraguay402207 Altbergthal 1963 Canada, Paraguay - - Las Pavas 1963 Paraguay1710 Schönthal 1967 Paraguay - - Riva Palacios 1967 Mexico5,7285,560 Las Piedras 1 1967 Canada - - Swift Current 1968 Mexico 2,614 2,925 Sommerfeld 1968 Mexico 669 920 Santa Rita 1968 Mexico 1,579 2,010 Nueva Esperanza 1975 Mexico 2,687 3,748 Canadiense 2 1975 Canadiense 1 777 980 Valle Esperanza 1975/6 Mexico 2,318 2,305 Cupesi 1976 Canada, Las Pavas 753 530 Del Norte 1980 Mexico 1,016 1,323 Belice 1981 Mexico 2,139 2,620 Las Piedras 2 1984 Las Piedras 1 1,150 848 Nueva Holanda 1984 Las Pavas 698 824 Neu Bergthal 1986 Belice, Canada, Altbergthal 499 640 Pinondi 1988 Riva Palacios 1,533 2,429 Chihuahua 1989 Bolivia 332 607 Campo León 1991 Bolivia 73 40 Yanahigua 1991/2 Valle Esperanza 723 1,116 Las Palmas 1992 Paraguay, Las Plamas 254 322 Valle Nuevo 1993 Swift Current 1,185 1,699 Manitoba 1993 Riva Palacios 1,825 1,669 Leoncito 1994 Bolivia 11 10 Santa Clara 1994 Sommerfeld 248 456 Durango 1 1994 Paraguay 1,813 2,846 Oriente 1995/6 Santa Rita 651 1,063 Alberta 1996 Canada 167 - Casas Grandes 1996 Mexico 280 883 El Cerro 1996 Las Piedras 2 - 506 El Dorado 1996 Riva Palacios 298 1,848 El Este 1996 Cupesi - - Fresnillo 1996 Mexico 164 271 Hohenau 1996 Paraguay 336 634 Centro Shalom 1997 Valle Espeeanza 20 37 Del Sur 1997 Mexico - 1,063 El Tinto 1997 Paraguay 66 823 Florida 1997 Del Norte 8 343 La Luna 1997 Mexico, Bolivia 15 - Milagrosa 1997 Belize 14 266 Monte Cristo 1997 Canada 9 - Waldheim 1998 Paraguay - 243 Villa Cariño 1998 Las Piedras 1 - 227 Buena Vista 1999 Bolivia - 33 Durango 2 2001 Mexico - - La Sierra 2002 Argentina - 228 El Palmar 2002 Paraguay - 292 La Estrella 2002 Canada, Bolivia - 220 Berlin 2003 N. Esperanza - 513 Nueva Asención 2004 Valle Nuevo - 448 IBNIAS (Pailòn) 2004 Bolivia - 66 Monte Rico 2004 Swift Current - 384 Neuland 2004 Paraguay - 384 Nordenheim 2005 S. Rita - 65 La Honda 2005 Durango 1 - 249 Barrio N. Estrella 2005 Bolivia - 60 Nueva México 2005 Riva Palacios - 507 Villa Hermosa 2005 Valle Esperanza - 270 Villa Nueva (Pailon) 2005 Bolivia - 207 Schöntal (S. Pablo) 2005 Fresnillo (Chihuahua) - 105 Rio Nego 2006 Swift Current - 120 California 2006 Manitoba - 22 Las Piedras 2006 Belize - 30 Bajio Verde 2007 Paraguay - 16 TotalSchartner, Sieghard and Schartner, Sylvia: Bolivien: Zufluchtsort der konservativen Mennoniten, Asunción 2009, pp.48–49.33,08949,813 AffiliationMembershipin 2009Membershipin 2012Altkolonier Mennonitengemeinde14,42419,096Canadian Old Colony Mennonites344524Sommerfelder Mennonitengemeinde2,0652,157Bergthaler Mennonitengemeinde199557Reinländer Mennonitengemeinde147203Kleingemeinde394682Conservative (Plain) Mennonites70105La Iglesia Evangélica Anabautista en Bolivia630630Iglesia Evangélica Menonita Boliviana450450Iglesia Misionera Anabaptista90Independent colonies125494Total18,84824,988
Rape and sexual assaults
In 2011, eight men belonging to the Manitoba Mennonite Colony were convicted of a series of sexual assaults committed from 2005 to 2009. Prior to the discovery, the rapes had been attributed to a ghost or demon. The victims were reported to be between the ages of 3 and 65. The offenders used a type of gas used by veterinarians to sedate animals during medical procedures. Despite long custodial sentences for the convicted men, an investigation in 2013 reported continuing cases of similar assaults and other sexual abuses. Canadian author Miriam Toews has made these crimes the center of her 2018 novel Women Talking.Schwartz, Alexandra (28 March 2019). A Beloved Canadian Novelist Reckons with Her Mennonite Past, The New Yorker. Retrieved 11 April 2020.
Literature
Huttner, Jakob. Zwischen Eigen-art und Wirk-lichkeit: Die Altkolonie-Mennoniten im bolivianischen Chaco. Berlin 2012. Schartner, Sieghard and Schartner, Sylvia. Bolivien: Zufluchtsort der konservativen Mennoniten. Asunción 2009. Cañás Bottos, Lorenzo. Old Colony Mennonites in Argentina and Bolivia: Nation Making, Religious Conflict and Imagination of the Future. Leiden et al. 2008. Hedberg, Anna Sofia. Outside the world: Cohesion and Deviation among Old Colony Mennonites in Bolivia. Uppsala 2007. Pasco, Gwenaëlle. La Colonisation Mennonite en Bolivie: Culture et agriculture dans l'Oriente. Paris 1999.
References
External links Photographic essay on the Mennonites of Bolivia Butet-Roch, Lawrence (text); Busqué, Jordi (photographs) (February 27, 2018) "Step Back in Time With the Mennonites of Bolivia", National Geographic. "Data for "Pious Pioneers: The expansion of Mennonite colonies in Latin America"", This data is provided in support of the paper "Pious Pioneers: The expansion of Mennonite colonies in Latin America", published in Journal of Land Use Science, December 15, 2020, 1–17, Taylor and Francis Accessed August 29, 2020. Bolivia's isolated Mennonite community