Horrible. Just horrible.

I know. Yet there's this serenity in those photographs - the one with the buggy under the sunrise just ripped my heart out.

No one deserves the fate that befell these young girls, but these people least of all. They willingly sacrifice so many modern comforts for a life they find more comfort in, and they harm no one in pursuit of their religion and values.

One of the only tangible payoffs for this sacrifice, is that they exist mostly crime free in a society otherwise riddled with it.

It seems so unfair that they should have to both sacrifice AND endure such brutal crime at the same time...that their one tangible gift in this life should be stolen this way.

Very beautifully said, Shannon.

The only issue I take with the Amish is that they fought all the way to the Supreme Court for the right to pull their children from school after the eighth grade and won. I respect their religious values, especially since, like you said, they harm noone, but I don't think any child should be deliberately denied an education so that, should they chose to live life in another fashion upon reaching adulthood, they are left with a serious disadvantage to pursue their own goals.

It's so awful and heartbreakingly powerful and mystically, transcendantly wonderful.

I start to cry everytime I have to go to the post to answer a comment.

I'm sure they were already angels, because they couldn't have been real.

Yesterday, as most of the funerals were taking place, there was a sidebar story on one of the news stations about the power of forgiveness. The families of these little girls had forgiven the murderer. One girl's family invited Roberts' widow and children to attend their child's funeral - not to rub their faces in the pain that man caused, but to acknowledge their own pain and offer comfort.

Where does that strength come from? That forgiveness, almost more than the horror of the crime, is what completely astounds me.

That's what made me cry the most.

Yes, Shannon...to me, that is the most amazing part. That this horrible thing happened only a few days ago and yet, many of the parents are ready to forgive.

I imagine that in many other communities, if a funeral procession had to go past the murderer's house...well, there would probably be words and gestures. I'm guessing that with the Amish there was either silence or prayer.

That is definitely a part of what is so compelling about this story. It's the worst of human character in one man bringing out the best in others. What special people.

I agree with your point about education, Emily.

One other thing I find a little ironic is that they are so ready to forgive this man who committed this crime against their children, but they embrace the practice of shunning, should one of their people feel compelled to leave the order, and say, pursue a college education. I guess this is the only way they can perpetuate their way of life, but it is curious how forgiveness applies for one unspeakably horrible crime, but not for another, lesser (at least in my non-Amish opinion)one.

Still, I have an enormous respect for them and the lives they live in the middle of our modern chaos.

Shannon,
From what I understand about shunning, it's meant as a punishment for disobedience. Conformity is obviously a big part of being Amish and "coloring outside the lines," so to speak, isn't really tolerated. It's rarely permanent.

Then there's the whole rumspringa thing - tthere's a documentary I saw about Amish kids running wild (it's allowed - it's seen as a part of life)

I like the rumspringa thing because it shows (to my mind anyway) that the Amish know that you must CHOOSE that lifestyle. It is not default. Everyone is allowed to have a season where they run wild, and have keggers in the barn ... boys and girls are allowed to have sleepovers together, in the same bed if they want to ... it's all a part of growing up. Then - it is assumed that that time will end - and you must CHOOSE the life. 90% of Amish kids choose that life - the other 10% know that they will be shunned, so it's obviously a very tough choice to make.

I like, though, that they have this escape built in to the whole process - they know that the kids will want to let off steam, go to concerts, buy CDs, whatever - so they can taste temptation and then turn their backs on it, should they choose. It seems a very practical way to look at the hormonal insanity of adolescence.

The documentary about it is amazing - there's the weird dichotomy of an Amish girl, about 18 years old, in her white bonnet, and apron, standing outside a barn, and saying, "Man, I miss Gobsmack - I loved going to see them. But it's all right. My life is good now."

Etc. Really kind of amazing.

Sheila,
I know. Just the cover of the film - a picture of an Amish girl with her little bonnet, smoking a cigarette.

Amazing, right?? Great film.

I loved the Amish man - an adult - in his 30s - and he was sitting on a picnic table with his plump pretty wife in her bonnet beside him - and he was asked what he missed about "the English" world.

And he said, immediately, "The music." But with this big smile that ... I don't know ... let me know that he had made peace with that sacrifice.

I actually haven't seen the film yet. It's on my list of "must see," somewhere close to the top. Once I do, I'll probably post about it and count on you to get into one of our typically long discussions about it.

It's funny, because that's the one thing about Amish life that I seriously know I could not tolerate. No music. I've been thinking a lot about it over the last year or so, about how simple that life is. There's no clutter. No phone or electricity bills. Hell, there's not even a rest of the world. There's this one tiny little spot that you occupy, where you work, live, love and die and THAT'S IT. With my illness, that life actually looks VERY appealing, as much as the big, bad larger world excites me, amazes me, disgusts me, and makes me extatic and curious, sometimes, just retreating from it all forever looks pretty damn good too.

But I'd have to be able to take music with me. I could do with the candlelight and hard work of that kind of subsistence living. I could do without TV, maybe without movies...but NOT. MUSIC. I'd even settle for having to just make it myself with my guitar or violin or voice. But I could not surrender it forever.

The sacrifices these people make for their love of God astonish me. The things they give up. The comforts they do without. The backbreaking way of life they live. AMAZING. They have fascinated me for decades now.

You know what - I was thinking of something else. The whole world has heard about this - "the Amish shootings" - but what about other Amish communities in the US? This is something that's happened within a few hundred miles of where they live and they probably had to hear about it from "the English" when they traveled into town in their buggies from local people. I wonder how deeply it hurt them? Like THS wrote in the comments at her post, they work so hard to purge their own communities from this sort of evil and live relatively quiet, unremarkable lives as a result. This must have hit them pretty hard.

Oh, and the horse-and-buggy funeral procession? KILLED ME. I'm serious. I've been watching a video of it for the last hour. All the local non-Amish that showed up, almost if they were watching some solemn parade, in loving support of their neighbors who live a life they will never understand, yet they still manage between their communities to have a happy co-existence of commerce and friendship? Beautiful.

BEAUTIFUL. There are so many things about this horrible event that are both tragic and beautiful. I hate it and love it so much at the same time. I wish it never happened, but find incredible faith in humanity and all of our quirks in the resulting aftermath.

Hon, I'm crying. I know just what you mean. This is why America is the greatest country on earth, and I say that with no hesitation whatsoever.

And now I'm crying. Its funny that so many see the Amish as "closeminded and backwards" when in actuality we as a culture could learn alot from them. Forgiveness and faith, obidence and peace. Really moving pictures.

See here and here.

Prof,
Thank you for those links. Beautiful posts. The second one, however, led me via the comments to the Townhall article by Mike Gallagher. Good for him.

What is with those Westboro freaks? I'm sorry, I've ignored them as kooks up until now, but reading that they were going to show up at those funerals? Are they out of their cotton-picking minds? What in the WORLD could possibly be their motivation? Those people are SICK. SICK. SICK. I know a lot of people like to pick on them in that really condescending "aren't they just provincial little Christians?" kind of way, but these people are ANYTHING but Christian.

Seriously, I am so angry right now I can barely think straight. I think I'm going to have to go back and read the polite, respectful columns you linked first to get over my disgust and keep this thread and its subject dignified.