Ira Wagler, running around

I like to check in at Ira Wagler’s blog from time to time.  Always nice writing.  Ira grew up Amish in Canada and Iowa, and thus can offer a viewpoint that non-Amish people, like yours truly, cannot.

In a recent post, Ira shares his personal take on Rumspringa.  He comes out against some popular perceptions of the ‘running around’ time and explains how it plays out in a few different Amish communities.

Ira also describes his own youth experience, and what it was like to leave Amish society behind.  Here’s an excerpt:

The first few times I left, I had every intention of returning and settling down. It wasn’t even a question in my mind. Just a year or two, a taste of the outside, then I’d be content to live out my days in the Amish faith where I was born. Calm and settled in the simple life.Marry. Raise a family. Perhaps write some apologetics, as my father did. Watch my children grow.

But it didn’t happen. In fact, it pretty much went just like the preachers always claimed it would. Once the “world” gets its grip on you, the probability of return recedes into impossibility. One can weep and wail and repent at leisure, but it will be too late.  You can’t go back.

Click to read the rest of Ira Wagler’s story of running around and choosing life in the English world.