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====Mennonites in Bolivia==== | ====Mennonites in Bolivia==== | ||
*In the early-to-mid 16th century, Mennonites began to move from the Low Countries to the '''Vistula delta region of Prussia, seeking religious freedom and exemption from military service.''' | |||
I*n the 1760s, Catherine the Great of Russia invited Mennonites from Prussia to settle '''north of the Black Sea''' in exchange for religious freedom and exemption from military service, a precondition founded in their commitment to non-violence. '''The ancestors of the Bolivian Mennonites settled in South Russia two main waves in the years 1789 and 1804, leaving Danzig and the Polish Vistula delta because they were being annexed by Prussia.''' | |||
*After Russia introduced the general conscription in 1874, many Mennonites migrated to the US and Canada. n the years after 1873 some 11,000 left the Russian Empire and settled in '''Manitoba, Canada, and an equal number went to Kansas, Nebraska and Dakota territory.''' | |||
*The Russian Mennonites settled in Canada until a universal, secular compulsory education was implemented in 1917 that required the use of the English language, which the more conservative Mennonites saw as a threat to the religious basis of their community. The more conservative Mennonites from Russia, some 6,000 people, '''left Canada between 1922 and 1925 and settled in Mexico'''. Another 1,800 more conservative Mennonites migrated to the '''Chaco region in Paraguay in 1927'''. | |||
*In 1930 and in 1947 the Paraguayian Mennonites were joined by '''Mennonites coming directly from Russia'''. In the years after 1958 some 1,700 Mennonites from the Mexican settlements moved to what was then '''British Honduras and today is Belize'''. | |||
*'''The Bolivian government granted a privilege to future Mennonite immigrants including ''freedom of religion, private schools and exemption from military service''''' in the 1930s, but that was not deployed until the 1950s. | |||
*Between 1954 and 1957, a first group of 37 families '''from various Mennonite colonies in Paraguay''' established '''''Tres Palmas colony''', 25 km northeast of Santa Cruz de la Sierra. Soon, a second colony was established five km away from Tres Palmas by a group of 25 conservative families from Menno Colony in Paraguay. The settlers from Paraguay were experienced and well prepared to practice agriculture in a subtropical climate. '''In 1959, the total Mennonite population in Bolivia was 189.''' | |||
*In 1963, new settlements were founded where Mennonites '''from Paraguay and Canada lived together'''. | |||
*In 1967, '''Mennonites from Mexico and from their daughter colonies in Belize began to settle in the Santa Cruz Department'''. '''Las Piedras colony''', founded 1968, was the first colony founded exclusively by Mennonites from Canada. Most settlers in Bolivia were traditional Mennonites who wanted to separate themselves more from "the world". '''Altogether there were about 17,500 Mennonites living in 16 colonies in Bolivia by 1986, of whom nearly 15,000 were Old Colony Mennonites and 2,500 Bergthal or Sommerfeld Mennonites.''' | |||
===Emigration=== | ===Emigration=== | ||