MennoLink Books and Music

Copyright 2008 Herald Press

This colorful book on PARAGUAY is the first comprehensive English language tour guide published about this small, land-locked country. The first three chapters on Basics, Information on Getting There, and Information While Being There provide the nuts and bolts: from the name 'Paraguay', to facts and figures, demographics, geography, economy, passports and visas, airlines, clothing, inoculation, health, insurance, customs, going solo vs. group tour, weather, getting around, email, tipping, embassies, to hospitals.

The next three chapters, History, Culture, and Asuncion, describe the Jesuit period, the Triple Alliance War, the Chaco War, politics, music, language and literature, painting, sculpture, carvings, museums, universities, monuments, strolls through Asuncion, proud buildings, memorable restaurants, great lodging, and the Mennonite impact. A Mennonite writer and a painter are also featured. The four chapters on going North, South, East and West of Asuncion explore the countryside, with the chapter on the West detailing the civilizing of the Chaco by the Mennonites.

The final two chapters, Uniquely Paraguay and Oddities explain the name Guarani, nanduti, sopa Paraguaya, yerba mate, algorrobo, mandioca, long life milk, the Southern Cross, and the reversal of periods and commas. The Appendix contains measurement conversion factors, basic Spanish, bibliography, and personal interest stories such as Kornelius Issak, Liese Kaethler, Madame Lynch, and Katharina Warkentin

Copyright 2009 Erwin Booschmann

A major economic metamorphosis happened in the Paraguayan Chaco beginning in the 1960's. It followed thirty years of hardship and little progress for Mennonite immigrants from Canada and Mennonite refugees from Russia. The effort to settle an indigenous population greater than the Mennonite population in the succeeding thirty years makes this a curious event in world history.

In 1951 William T. Snyder, Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) Associate Executive Secretary, recruited a Mennonite couple graduating that year from Bethel College in Kansas, to manage a joint venture experimental farm in Fernheim Colony, Paraguay. It almost didn't work out. The Unruhs tried to disconnect from MCC after their first five year term expired, the working environment and living conditions so difficult; the Chaco was known as a 'Green Hell.' But they were moved to return and spent their working lives in the Chaco, 32 years altogether until illness intervened, along the way endearing themselves to the Mennonite settlers and to the native Indians.

Given the human yearning for precise explanations and an authoritative point of origin, the reader is taken by surprise encountering restraint, gentleness and straightforward reasoning in this gradual and complex evolutionary development. Leadership spontaneously rises to the occasion in a prosaic manner; scrupulously methodical, patient, nonassertive and nonjudgmental. This self-effacing style gave few persons in North America a clue-as it was happening-that the depth of the Unruh's imprint on Mennonite ethnicity in Paraguay might be significant or lasting.

Copyright 2009 Philip Roth

Jumping Into Empty Space tells two stories; the beginning of a remarkable economic turn-around in a battered country at the hand of this fearless business strategist; and the emergence of a true leader, told with unusual honesty, wisdom, and faith.

Copyright 2008 Good Books

"In this century no story out of the Mennonite experience has captured the hearts and minds of all Mennonites and Amish groups as the story of the Berlin Exodus in 1947. The departure from Berlin in the early morning hours of January 30 of 1,200 Mennonite refugees from Russia is part of a larger epic of the movement of 12,000 uproooted Mennonites to new homes in Paraguay, Uruguay, and North America. It brings to memory the biblical narrative of the mighty works of God in that first Exodus."--Robert Kreider

These 16 chapters plus other materials examine theological understandings in the light of current world realities. This includes reflection on the reality of globalized culture and structures of power, and on the role of national histories. Chapters also reflect on identity and context and how these shape understandings of peace. Authors look at biblical models of peacemaking but also explore the way concepts of land and place, in Christian and in other faith traditions, contribute to peace. Reflection from a variety of contexts, including Nigeria, Korea, Colombia, Paraguay, the British Isles and North America, adds richness to the collection.

Copyright 2004 Cascadia Publishing House

Copyright 2001.