Better Off_ Flipping the Switch on Technology - Eric Brende [37]
Admittedly, upon first arriving, our expectations had not been too high. We had tread lightly, hoping to steal our way into what appeared to be a closed cultural enclave. But now that we were in its midst, the surprise was on us. Even more obliquely, almost like the pumpkin vines, the Minimites were angling and ambling their way into our habits of mind and being. Our clothing, now half-Minimite, prompted us to wonder: had we pulled the cloth over them, or had they pulled it over us? Our hosts had perhaps one advantage: their beguilement was unintended.
One of their favorite sayings was “Do not let the right hand know what the left hand is doing.” Another was “He who seeks to save his life loses it; and he who gives up his life saves it.” These adages, of course, came from the Bible, and they gave expression to the disposition the Minimites held chief among Christian attitudes, Gelassenheit, or self-surrender. Gelassenheit referred less to any particular aim than to acceptance of what may be, a larger and partly hidden design that they did not fully understand.
Modern technology, I suspect, far from being neutral in its effects, has more than one underlying purpose or built-in tendency: besides reducing the need for physical effort (a kind of material surrender), it helps us avoid the need for cooperation or social flexibility (a kind of social or metaphysical surrender). All too readily it countermands the uncertainty that goes with Gelassenheit. Cars, telephones, message machines, caller ID, and e-mail grant us unprecedented powers to associate with whom we want, when we want, to the degree we want, under the terms we want, finessing and filtering out those we don’t want—and thin out the possibilities of social growth accordingly.
Mary and I had delayed paying a visit to our neighbors’ church, I suppose because we feared deeper social entanglements. Why wasn’t there a “delete” button we could push to eliminate this part of our exploration? We dreaded an awkward theological standoff. Long ago, certain of our Catholic predecessors had punished Anabaptists for the crime of adult rebaptism by burning them at the stake or flaying them alive. The Minimites had not forgotten. Vivid reminders filled the pages of a book that rested on a prominent shelf in nearly every Minimite parlor, the Martyr’s Mirror. Our only defense was that Catholic political authorities had not had a monopoly on cruelty during the Reformation, that Protestants had been no less ferocious in their persecution of Anabaptists. Not that this was cause for bragging.
Still, were we to continue our relationship with our neighbors, there was only one logical next step.
Feeling like mangy goats approaching a den of wary sheep, we pedaled toward a low and nondescript meetinghouse that was used as a school on other days. Today, Sunday, it would serve as a place of worship. Inside, hoping no one would notice us, we tiptoed into a large, bare room crowded with Minimites in plain dress. As was traditional among Old Order groups, men and women sat apart. After squeezing my way through the rows and seating myself gingerly on one of the hard wooden benches, I cast a guilty glance around. On all sides living hillocks surrounded me, broad shoulders hunched and rippling in dark blue or brown long-sleeved shirts draped in blue denim vests. I winced to reflect that I alone wore a short-sleeved white shirt without a vest. Across the room, amid a flock of white head coverings, Mary was the odd bird with the purple kerchief tied over her hair. The men had all left their hats at the door, and for the first time I noticed the white band that