A Family Blessed With Some Heroic Ancestors

Inscription on an Anabaptist Memorial Plaque in Zurich, Switzerland, dedicated July 7, 2004
"Here were drowned in the middle of the Limmat River from a fishing platform Felix Manz and five other Anabaptists during the Reformation period between 1527 and 1532. The last such Anabaptist executed, Hans Landis, was in Zurich in 1614."

Dear granddaughters and grandsons,

I pray none of you will ever be asked to give up your lives for your faith, your country or for any other reason, but we do want you to know about some of your ancestors who did in fact die as martyrs for a cause they were deeply committed to, or who otherwise made great sacrifices for their beliefs. 

Hans Landis, mentioned in the plaque above, was your grandmother Alma Jean's great great great great great great great great great great grandfather. 

His crime? Holding illegal church meetings in his house, and teaching that no one should be forced to join the official state-sponsored religion of his native Switzerland or any other state church, Protestant or Catholic. He believed everyone should have the freedom to practice whatever faith, or no faith, as he or she chose. He also believed and taught that no one should ever be forced to kill people in a state sponsored war. In addition, Hans was accused of raising money to help poor families in order to entice them to join his church. He admitted to helping people in need, but not for that reason.

Because of the heroism of our ancestor and many others like him in the free church (Anabaptist/Mennonite) movement we can now take that kind of religious freedom for granted. But back then if you lived in a Catholic state you had to be baptized as a Catholic, or if you were born in a Lutheran or Reformed state you were forced to have your children baptized as Protestants. Hans Landis and his brave wife Barbara refused. 

Without state approved baptism, people were denied rights as citizens and were often subject to fines, imprisonments, torture, banishment or death. Hans Landis chose death over giving up what he believed was right.

Over a century later my great great great great great great grandfather Christian Yoder, Sr., a widower from the same part of Switzerland as Hans Landis, accompanied his 17-year-old son, Christian, Jr., on a hazardous six week journey to America in 1742 on the ship Francis and Elizabeth. They left everything behind rather than having young Christian forced to go into hiding or to be inducted into the Swiss army. 

Years later, in 1776, Christian Yoder, Jr., moved his own family by covered wagon from eastern Pennsylvania to the westernmost part of state rather than having his own draft-age sons conscripted to fight in the Revolutionary War against King George III, the English monarch who had granted them asylum. 

Meanwhile, in 1754, another of our ancestors, Jacob Hochstetler, refused to allow his sons to shoot Indian invaders who were attacking their home in southeastern Pennsylvania, resulting in Jacob's wife and their young daughter losing their lives and Jacob and two of his sons being taken captive by native tribes in the northern part of the state for nearly two years. 

Your fourth cousin once removed, Irvin Stutzman, now our neighbor here in Park View, wrote three books telling their story. Had Jacob attempted to resist by force the entire family would likely have fared even worse, would likely all have been killed. As it was, he and his second wife Barbara became our ancestors, and those of thousands of Mennonite and Amish descendants living all over the US.

These are just a few of your good forefathers and mothers whose courageous convictions and commendable life we would do well to be inspired by and learn from. And they include people like your uncle Brad, who at 17 decided that as a conscientious objector to war he could not register for the nation's draft, resulting in his not being eligible for federal student loans for his college education.

We pray each of you will have the courage to do what is good, right and life-giving, no matter what the cost, and to be an inspiring examples for your own children and grandchildren to follow.

Love and prayers,

Grandpa and Grandma Yoder