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Amish seek privacy for 'our 9/11'
05/10/2006 08:44 - (SA)
Nickel Mines - As the Amish prepare to bury five young victims of a horrific school shooting, they ask to be allowed to do so in private.
National mourning of similar tragedies, such as the massacre at Columbine High School, has been enabled in part by media coverage - something the Amish specifically spurned in a statement on Wednesday that pleaded for privacy.
Instead, the Amish - who shun modern conveniences and live modestly - are coping with the slayings by looking inward. They are relying on themselves and their faith, just as they have for centuries, to get them through what one Amish bishop called "our 9/11".
White dress and cape
The four girls to be buried on Thursday are Naomi Rose Ebersole, 7; Marian Fisher, 13; Mary Liz Miller, 8; and her sister Lena Miller, 7. The funeral for a fifth girl, Anna Mae Stoltzfus, 12, is scheduled for Friday.
About 300 to 500 people are expected at each funeral, said funeral director Philip W Furman. The church-led services typically last about two hours before mourners travel in horse-drawn buggies to a cemetery for a short graveside service.
Amish custom calls for simple wooden caskets, narrow at the head and feet and wider in the middle. An Amish girl is typically laid to rest in a white dress, a cape, and a white prayer-covering on her head, Furman said.
Deaths accepted as 'God's will'
The Amish say they are quietly accepting the deaths as God's will.
"They know their children are going to heaven. They know their children are innocent ... and they know that they will join them in death," said Gertrude Huntington, a Michigan researcher who has written a book about children in Amish society.
"The hurt is very great," Huntington said. "But they don't balance the hurt with hate."
Forgiveness for gunman's family
In the aftermath of Monday's violence, the Amish have reached out to the family of the gunman, Charles Carl Roberts IV, 32, who committed suicide during the attack in a one-room schoolhouse.
Dwight Lefever, a Roberts family spokesperson, said an Amish neighbour comforted the Roberts family hours after the shooting and extended forgiveness to them. Among Roberts' survivors are his wife and three children.
"I hope they stay around here and they'll have a lot of friends and a lot of support," said Daniel Esh, a 57-year-old Amish artist and woodworker whose three grandnephews were inside the school during the attack.
Funds
Roberts's relatives may even receive money from a fund established to help victims and their families, said Kevin King, executive director of Mennonite disaster services, an agency managing the donations.
Though the Amish generally do not accept help from outside their community, King quoted an Amish bishop as saying, "We are not asking for funds. In fact, it's wrong for us to ask. But we will accept them with humility."
- AP
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