Svjetlana mlinarevic

Escaping to a new world

Svjetlana Mlinarevic

Hearld-Leader

November 4, 2013

 

Imagine living in a world where you are no longer considered a person or an individual, but a worker whose sole purpose is to labour for the collective. This was the life lived by Junia and Rodney Waldner.

 

The Waldners, who are cousins, grew up in Hillside Hutterite colony just north of Brandon. It was when they were in their 20s that they decided they wanted more from life. They decided to leave the colony seven years ago and since then have written a book, Hutterites: Our Story to Freedom, detailing their experiences along with seven other ex-colony members from North Dakota and Canada.

 

In the book, Junia, 29, details her life as a Hutterite woman. She writes: I grew up as a Hutterite. My prescribed task was the same as any other Hutterite woman: get married and have children. I was very unhappy .... I dreamed of being outgoing and joyful .... For those that think a Hutterite life is a wholesome, protected, loving and an innocent place for kids, let me tear away the curtain and reveal the way it really is.

 

“After I left, it was only then that I realized how much control and oppression is actually there,” said Junia. “I felt it when I was there, but I didn’t know a system could do that to me. I thought it was just me, that’s who I am, I’m just not a happy person.”

 

Before the age of 15, girls at the colony would perform babysitting duties. After 15, Junia was delegated to work butchering livestock, a position she never aspired to. Only once did she express some of her feelings of isolation to her sister and mother, but she could never “express her heart.”

 

“The whole system is not personal at all. Everybody is one. You don’t express yourself to anybody,” said Rodney.

 

For Rodney, 29, a depression had set in as he questioned the oppression and double standards he felt in the colony.

 

The leaders are quite content to keep the people in the system functioning in a state of robotic ignorance ­— he wrote — I experienced living in a place that receives blanket protection as a religious organization, thus avoiding having to pay wages, comply with child labour laws and following safety measures. Yet, they are clearly running a commercial operation no different than any other business or factory outside the colony.

 

Rodney claims colony leaders would not let members keep savings accounts, instead members were given a monthly allowance of $3. All their clothing, personal hygiene products and other necessities were chosen and provided by the leaders of the colony, who controlled all the money.

 

A spiritual awakening within Rodney and Junia made them question the Hutterite belief system. This led to the cousins being excommunicated from the colony and shunned by its leaders, one of whom was an uncle. Some of their family followed them in leaving the colony. For those that stayed, they have had no contact with the Waldners.

 

“The Hutterite system doesn’t promote true Christianity where Jesus Christ is your purpose and reason for living. It’s a business,” said Rodney, who added he was not allowed to testify his devotion.

 

Although leaving the colony was terrifying for all nine members in the book, since that time they have experienced things they never would have if they had stayed in the colony, including having their own businesses.

 

“I felt like, I’m going out into something that I’ve never seen before, done before. I was close to 20 years old. It was a whole new world,” said Rodney. “It was exciting to get my own car for the first time.”

 

But leaving the colony was not easy. Retaliation from colony members involved vandalizing Rodney’s car and putting fence staples in the driveways to blow out the tires.

 

“I wouldn’t have wanted my worst enemy to have the life I had. To feel what I felt. I was nobody. I was dead inside,” said Junia. “I don’t want anyone to have that.”

 

The message Junia and Rodney want people to realize is that this isn’t a personal attack on the people in the colonies, but the system.

 

“It’s important for people to know, we love the Hutterites. We love the people and that’s why we wrote the book. There is a way out of that oppression,” said Rodney.