Mennonite Profiles
Sara, a Swiss Mennonite Among Us
by Helen Rose Pauls

Sara Friesen of Chilliwack is firmly entrenched in a Mennonite Brethren congregation, but she originated in a partially Amish Mennonite community in Iowa. Her mother's family had earlier switched to the more liberal 'Old Mennonites.'

Sara Jane was born to Paul and Kathryn Snyder in 1942 in Kalona, a town with beautiful farms, 18 miles south of Iowa City, where her father raised kosher chickens for Chicago markets, and tended the local mail route. Her mother, who taught eight grades in a one-room school, was from a family of 16 children of the Miller and Swartzendruber clans. Sara's great grandfather, a farmer, Benedict Miller, was also a tailor who once fashioned a suit for the Governor of Iowa.

The Snyder family can trace its roots to Berne, Switzerland [1534] but dispersed to villages in Holland and Germany in the 1600's. The first Snyders arrived in Philadelphia in 1736 with 388 others on the ship "Harle" and moved on to Lancaster County. Some Snyders became United Empire Loyalists and left for Ontario on the Conestoga Trail in 1806-7, settling in Berlin (later renamed Kitchener during WWI). But Sara's families of origin stayed in the USA and eventually settled in Iowa.

At first, they wanted to keep to the old ways. School went to eighth grade, as education was not a priority. Phones were not allowed as they were a link to the "world", and when Sara's grandfather, Sam B. Miller, had one installed to communicate with the doctors at the hospital where he had a very sick daughter, the family had to leave the Amish church. Sara's uncle, who combed his hair into a pompadour, was also asked to leave. They joined the Old Mennonites (which have since merged with the General Conference Mennonites to form the Mennonite Church.) Some Amish joined the Congregationalists or the Methodists, or left the faith altogether.

During WW I, Sara's father, Paul Snyder, who had a strong conscience against war and killing, refused all military training and duties when he was drafted into the army. He was stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington, and suffered at army camp because he refused even the uniform. He spent forty days of mistreatment in the jailhouse. There was no conscientious objector status in the USA. Later he was stationed in the Cascades and fought forest fires.

Sara was the fourth child, eleven years younger than her nearest sibling, and was doted on as a baby sister. She loved to sing. When Sara was two-and-a-half, her mother was invited to a class on "Mennonites" with Professor Marcus Bach of the School of Religion in Iowa City. "Dr. Bach asked me to sing," says Sara, "and I belted out 'Climb, Climb Up Sunshine Mountain' and 'Beulah Land.' I have been singing ever since, in choirs, trios, quartets or just at home. In those days we sang a cappella, as instruments were frowned on. I still especially enjoy a cappella choral music."

Sara's middle years were enriched by a family who loved to travel and she remembers trips to the west coast to see where her father had been stationed, and a Billy Graham Crusade in Oregon in 1950. They also traveled to Puerto Rico, where her brother was fulfilling his alternative service. She attended a Mennonite high school where the girls wore little net prayer coverings during chapel, but only the most conservative and devout wore them in public. She remembers warm and stimulating teachers who were good role models.

Sara was baptized by pouring at the age of ten with 29 others when the bishop came to perform these rites. Communion was held twice a year and was taken very seriously. "We washed each others feet but could hardly keep from giggling," Sara remembers. "At church we were constantly admonished and monitored about non-essentials like the length of our hair. They used verses from Romans 12:2 or 1 Corinthians 11:5-16 about not being conformed to this world, and about hair coverings and submission. Movies, pool halls, make-up, jewelry, were forbidden, and we were not allowed to use musical instruments.

I remember my mother leading the congregational singing using a pitch pipe to start things off. The hymns in four-part harmony without accompaniment were amazing."

Sara attended Hesston College in Kansas for three years and finished at Goshen College in 1963. Here she met George Friesen from Greendale, B.C. After their marriage in 1965, they moved to Yarrow, where George taught at Sharon High from 1964-1969, when it closed its doors. They lived in a little white house on Yarrow Central Road and Sara worked in the office of Diamond Construction, and taught kindergarten class during VBS at Yarrow MB Church.

"People were very friendly and there was lots of visiting among the Sharon High teachers," remembers Sara. Church was in both English and German, and Sara could not understand much of the German. "Also, faspa was a new concept, but I enjoyed this tradition very much and learned to make platz instead of shoo fly pie."

Although Sara felt accepted by the other young couples at Yarrow MB Church, she was not eligible to take communion in Yarrow or join the church as she had not been baptised by immersion. She was asked to give her testimony at communion in front of the whole church, then sat in a little room off to the side while the church members discussed her faith statement and voted on her membership. Someone was thoughtful enough to sit with her during this time, and cheered her on when she passed. "That was just the way things were done in those days and I didn't resent it," says Sara.

After ten months in Kennedy Heights, Sara and George returned to Chilliwack and raised their three children there. Jennifer teaches at the local high school. Chris is assistant pastor at Lendrum MB Church in Edmonton. Matthew lives and works in Sweden. They were early members of the Sardis Community Church (MB) which began in 1975. Sara sings in the local "Evensong Chamber Singers", and sometimes performs in a mixed quartet in church. George and Sara have seven grandchildren, and enjoy books and gardening in their retirement. She still sometimes makes Shoo-Fly Pie.