After the age of three, the house 
child will slowly be weaned 
away from the nuclear family and 
start the steady ascent to 
full, responsible membership 
in the Hutterite colony. 
see why we could not just wear the 
cap and take off the head scarf when 
the weather was so hot, she was told, 
“We can’t expect to be comfortable 
here and there both.” (If you are com- 
fortable in this life, you should not 
expect to be comfortable in the here- 
after.) When she found many of the 
small regulations pertaining to the 
lower status of women irksome, mem- 
bers of the colony implied that perhaps 
she was forgetful of them because of 
her advanced age. This was an ef- 
fective means of soliciting conformity 
from a professionally competent child 
psychologist. With me, they implied 
that perhaps the colony work was too 
demanding. As status is closely tied 
to one’s ability to work hard, long, 
and fast, I shaped up and conformed. 
Because by Hutterite standards my 
husband (an art historian) was low 
on skills, he worked with the older 
adolescent boys, as well as with the 
married men. When they felt he was 
not paying enough attention to his job, 
they would call out the number of 
strokes it took him to sink a nail. 
The pressure on us to conform could 
not be resented because it grew out 
of the Hutterites’ deep conviction of 
the rightness of their way of life and 
out of their acceptance of us. Patiently 
they instructed us and helped us. I 
learned to pluck live geese and was 
helped to create a spotless, flower- 
accented house to welcome my hus- 
band to the colony. We were reminded 
that being a nice person had nothing 
to do with where we would spend eter- 
nity; we were either “in the ark” or 
we were “not in the ark.” The depth 
of their concern and generosity was evi- 
dent when they offered to come any 
time to start a community with us. Al- 
though they do not go out as mis- 
sionaries, the Hutterites were willing 
to send their centuries-old sermons 
with us. Twentieth-century individual- 
ists, we were privileged to share the 
details of everyday life with people 
who have all surrendered their own 
will and given themselves with sin- 
gleness of heart to God and church. □ 
46 
