THE AMERICANIZATION OF A RURAL IMMIGRANT CHURCH: THE GENERAL CONFERENCE MENNONITES IN CENTRAL KANSAS, 1874-1939

The purpose of this study is to investigate the Americanization of an immigrant church in rural North America. The study focuses on General Conference Mennonites who came from Russia and east Europe to settle in central Kansas in 1874. In Russia they had established an autonomous peoplehood characterized by nonconformity maintained through spatial isolation and the exclusive use of the German language. For nearly a century they escaped the full impact of Russification. Their immigration in 1874 represented an effort to retain an ethno-religious distinctiveness. In America they sought community autonomy; instead they were offered individual self-sufficiency. This individualistic freedom eventually eroded Mennonite community autonomy. In the absence of the Old World village social structure, the immigrant church in Kansas served as a center for identity formation. As the pressures of Americanization mounted, immigrants increasingly turned to the local congregation for support. In this way the church facilitated the Americanization process, emphasizing various aspects of the Mennonite ethos while forsaking other traditions that did not fit into the American Protestant experience. The Americanization of the Mennonite church in central Kansas is evidenced by a language shift, the impact of public schools and higher education, the infiltration of American Protestantism, the modification of certain church customs, and the alteration of Mennonite fine arts. In some respects their experience conforms to the model of assimilation formed by sociologist Milton Gordon. Their willingness to embrace American behavioral patterns while resisting a complete structural assimilation is true to the Gordon model. However, Mennonites in central Kansas following World War I deviated from Gordon\u27s model: as Mennonite churches took on characteristics of American Protestantism, there emerged a revitalized progressive Mennonitism. By 1939 Mennonite congregations in central Kansas displayed an identity that was less ethnocentric and more religiocentric; less immigrant and more denominational. After six decades they were both Mennonites and Americans, a people of two kingdoms