An Amish Family Christmas

by Murray Pura

  “Please don’t. I can’t have you under a bann too. It would be quite impossible if I were the only one who could speak in a house of four people. It would feel like a tomb.” She gave Naomi a cinnamon roll that was so warm the frosting had begun to melt down its sides. “Here. Perhaps this will sweeten your tongue so that you’ll only smile and nod when the bishop arrives.”

  Naomi picked away a strip of the roll and nibbled on it. “How many miracles is it you want God to perform for us?”

  “Why? Does his well ever run dry of grace?” She put a cinnamon roll on a plate and handed it to her. “Take this to your husband.”

  “My husband? All right.”

  Rebecca smiled. “It’s not an emergency, so no talking.”

  “Ja, ja. Nicht redden.”

  Micah wasn’t in the barn. She took the well-beaten path through the snow to the fenced pasture, where she soon spotted him pitching hay to the beef cattle, throwing it over the wooden rails. For a moment she stopped just to enjoy the smooth rhythm of his movements and his easy strength. Then she approached with the plate as if she were holding a whole cake in her hands. He didn’t notice her. She set it down in the snow a few feet from him, but he still didn’t turn to look.

  So what is it acceptable to do about cinnamon rolls in danger of freezing when your husband is under the bann?

  “Hey!” she shouted at one of the steers that was being pushy. “Kastrierten Bullen Geist! Wohnin du gehst!”

  Micah snapped his head around. She coughed. He saw the plate with the cinnamon roll on it. She glanced up at the sun, which was making its way through a great white heap of cumulus clouds, turned without making eye contact, and began walking back to the farmhouse.

  “Hey!”

  She stopped and looked back.

  “Nicht, die gut schmecken?”

  He wasn’t talking to her, but to the steers as they ate the hay and he ate the roll.

  Doesn’t that taste good?

  She smiled and carried on to the house.

  When she closed the door behind her, Rebecca asked, “So did you find him?”

  “Ja.”

  “And you gave him the cinnamon bun?”

  “Ja.”

  “Without speaking to him?”

  “I didn’t speak to him.”

  “Truly?”

  Naomi hung her coat on a peg. “I spoke to the steers.”

  Rebecca put her hands on her hips. “Vas? What are you talking about?”

  Naomi smiled and shrugged. “Let’s make some lunch and then prepare for the meeting with the leadership.”

  Bishop Fischer and the ministers came in from the bright December sunshine and blazing snow with smiles and a spattering of laughter, immediately asking to see Luke. He was waiting for them, seated at the kitchen table, rising to his feet as they removed their coats and hats and entered the house. They took his hand, and he returned their handshakes weakly but, Naomi noticed, with a trace of warmth in his eyes. The bishop and Minister Yoder hugged him, all the while praising God in German, and Luke raised his arms high enough to put them around their lower backs.

  “Wonderful. Thank God.” The bishop gripped both of Luke’s hands. “Let us pray with you.”

  The ministers gathered in a circle and bowed their heads as Bishop Fischer began. When he was finished, the others prayed, one after the other, Minister Yoder bringing it to a conclusion with one large hand resting on Luke’s shoulder. Then they sat at the table and helped themselves to the coffee and cinnamon rolls laid out before them.

  “We trust you’ll have your voice back soon too, eh?” Bishop Fischer smiled at Luke as he brought his coffee to his lips. “Always you sang well. I could always make you out no matter how many were singing at the same time.”

  Luke sat and listened to him, not drinking his coffee.

  The bishop leaned back and caught Naomi’s eye. “The ministers have read your letters.”

  Naomi nodded.

  “I would have brought them back to you, but you said I should let any of our people read them who felt an inclination to do so.”

  She nodded again.

  “So that will take several days as they circulate among the families.” He ran his fingers through his beard. “There will be no one who doesn’t thank God for the lives saved, no one.”

  “But that is not the point of the bann.” Minister Yoder folded his hands and rested them on the table near his half-eaten roll. “It’s the breaking of the Ordnung that has brought about the problem between your husband and the church. Not saving lives. For how could we censure someone for protecting the sanctity of human life?”

  Naomi kept her eyes down, looking at white drops of spilled cream and sprinkles of white sugar scattered over the table’s wooden surface. “If he hadn’t gone to Afghanistan, he couldn’t have saved the men and women whose mothers and wives write to me.”

  “God would have ordained others to do the work. He would have brought someone who is not Amish. Someone not called to be an Amish witness in the world,” rumbled Minister Yoder.

  “Except God called him to the war zone.”

  “He says.”

  Naomi lifted her eyes. “So you don’t think God could give you or anyone here a command that would go beyond the rules of our church?”

  “No.”

  “The man-made rules?”

  Minister Yoder shook his head. “No.”

  “So the Pharisees and religious rulers also thought.”

  Rebecca looked at her friend in surprise and alarm, eyes widening, and quickly spoke up before Minister Yoder could reply. “My brother gave us his reasons for his conduct.”

  Minister Yoder was scowling at Naomi, lines deepening around his eyes. He didn’t look at Rebecca. “We have heard the reasons.”

  “Suppose—”

  Yoder cut Rebecca off. “Suppose, suppose. Ja, that’s how your brother talks. Suppose, suppose. We are not in a fairy tale, I thank God.”

  “But if there was a gang fight outside our doors and men lay wounded in the ditch—”

  He snorted. “You and Micah and your drug gangs. They are in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Not here. They will never come here.”

  A hint of steel came into Rebecca’s voice. “Jesus told his parables. I will tell mine.”

  Yoder grunted but said nothing.

  “The wounded men are bleeding at the side of the road—”

  “Yes, yes,” the bishop interrupted. “It is as Minister Yoder says. We have been through all this before. We would call nine-one-one from the phone in the hut. We would try to stop the bleeding. We would do all we could to save them.”

  “But that’s what my brother did.”

  “Your brother traveled to a combat zone. That’s a far different matter. We merely take care of our neighbors.”

  “Christ taught that all men are our neighbors.”

  The bishop waved his hand. “It’s always apples and oranges. By helping the military wounded, Micah supported the war effort. By helping the wounded in your parable, we support nothing except the right of those made in God’s image to live and discover his grace.”

  “The soldiers can also be healed and live and find his grace.”

  “It supports the war effort. We cannot support a war directly or indirectly.”

  Naomi spoke up, hands folded on the table like Minister Yoder’s. “If you help the wounded of the drug gang, you help the sale of illegal drugs. How wicked is that?”

  “Vas?” rumbled Minister Yoder.

  “If you help a wounded man who is an atheist, you help unbelief grow. If you help a woman who is in favor of abortions, you help the practice of abortions to continue unabated. If you help a teenager who is a thief, you support robbery. Isn’t that what you are saying when you accuse Micah of spreading war by saving soldiers’ lives?”

  Into the silence came the tapping of Bishop Fischer’s fingers.

  Naomi spoke again. “We might as well not try to save anyone’s life ex
cept those who are Amish in good standing and not under any bann.”

  The bishop raised his hand. “Genug. Enough.” He pushed back his chair. “I cannot say what our people will do about the letters. We shall meet again in a week and let you know. Yet the decision rests on us, the leadership God Almighty has put in place, when it comes to matters of the Ordnung. Ja, and especially on my head. I will have the final say. So it is with our people. The responsibility is great. May not my soul hang in the balance? What if I should lead hundreds astray? Thousands? It is a weighty thing. You have your clever arguments. I have four hundred years of God’s command to our people—the Amish shall not kill.” He got to his feet. “Or aid those who kill.”

  The ministers rose. So did the two women. Luke remained in his seat.

  Ten

  The next morning Rebecca called down to Naomi from the head of the staircase. “So where is Luke? He’s not in his room or in the parlor.”

  Naomi glanced up from her sewing. “Oh, he’s helping Micah with the cattle.” She smiled. “Would you believe it? I even saw him pitching some hay a half hour ago.”

  Rebecca came down and sat by the front window and picked up her own sewing, a dress of hers that had torn on a nail. “When it comes to Luke, Gott ist auf der Uberholspur.” God is on the fast track.

  “Not so much with Bishop Fischer and Minister Yoder or the others,” mumbled Naomi as she worked on a pair of her husband’s pants.

  “They’re harder to deal with than Luke.”

  “And that’s surprising. Doesn’t our leadership walk with God?”

  Rebecca shook her head as she threaded a needle, one eye shut. “Bite your tongue, or your words will bite others.”

  “Hm.” Naomi held up the pants to look at them better. “I need to take them in a couple of inches.”

  “Don’t bother. We’ll fatten Micah up in no time.”

  “That won’t be so easy. When I walked by the barn the other day he was doing push-ups.”

  “In the barn?”

  “And when I came back that way he was using a low beam to do chin-ups.”

  Rebecca snorted. “The army. Give him time and he’ll become as lazy about exercise as the rest of the men.”

  “I wonder. He can be very stubborn and determined.”

  “Ja, well, we’ve seen that. He’s still under the bann because of that.”

  A shrill whine pierced the glass and entered the house.

  “The dirt bike.” Naomi put down her sewing. “Timothy Yoder.”

  “Rumspringa.”

  “But there is snow down.”

  “Not much. A great deal of it has melted over the last couple of days. Anyway, you can see the gravel road is clear enough.” Rebecca lifted her eyebrows. “So if Minister Yoder can indulge his son with a dirt bike, perhaps he’s not immoveable after all.”

  “Oh, he’ll say dirt bikes are one thing, but going to war is something else again. Apples and oranges.” She imitated his growl. “Rumspringa is rumspringa, a vow at baptism is a vow at baptism, war is war.”

  “Hush, Naomi.”

  “He will. You watch.”

  “I’m not going to watch your next spat with Minister Yoder because there’s not going to be one, ja? It won’t help you to argue with him. That won’t win him to your side.”

  “He’ll never be won to my side. So what does it matter if we have a good discussion?”

  “Discussion? Is that what you call it?” Rebecca folded her dress. “Now, what else is in the sewing bag?” She glanced out the window again. “So he has an audience now. That’s why he’s showing off.”

  Naomi saw the small crowd of thirteen- and fourteen-year-old boys who were watching Timothy Yoder do spins and leaps with his bike. Behind them stood three older girls.

  “Ah. Sarah Harshberger is there. Pretty Sarah with the golden hair and golden eyes. That’s why he’s practically doing somersaults.”

  Rebecca stood up. “I’ll bring the sewing bag here. Maybe we can both empty it before we start supper.” She walked away, still talking. “If we weren’t the last farm in the row, we wouldn’t have to listen to that racket. It’s because there is all this open road and no farmhouses but ours that Timothy is here. Minister Yoder probably sent him this way on purpose.”

  “Ha.” Naomi hunted for a spool of thread in a container at her feet. “To punish us?”

  “To rattle our brains until we have some sense. Rumspringa is rumspringa, a vow at baptism is a vow at baptism, war is war, a dirt bike at Christmas is a dirt bike at Christmas.”

  “Ja, ja.”

  Rebecca went upstairs. Naomi watched Timothy spin his bike in tight circles, making sure he sprayed Sarah and her friends with slush. They laughed and squealed and ran away. He called out to them, grinning, and then gunned his engine and raced in the opposite direction, taking a wide ditch with a high leap, twisting once in the air, and landing in a field of mud and ice. The girls came back to watch, and Sarah was clapping her hands. He walked his bike farther out into the field, straddling it with both legs, and then turned and faced them, revving his engine till it shrieked. Mud flying out from under his tires, his whole bike fish-tailing, Timothy headed back for the ditch, lifting his bike into the air.

  “Oh!”

  Naomi saw that his takeoff from the muddy field was not good. The bike struggled and then flipped. Naomi gasped as Timothy hit the ground first and the bike landed on him. She then saw a quick spray of blood. She jumped to her feet. Sarah began to scream.

  “What is it?” Rebecca had run to the head of the staircase. “What has happened?”

  Naomi was racing for the door. “Timothy has crashed. The bike landed on top of him.”

  Naomi didn’t even put on a coat. She ran from the farmyard and down the lane to the road. Sarah was still screaming. All of the boys had gathered around Timothy and the bike. He wasn’t moving or getting up. One of the boys turned away and fell down in the mud and snow, his hand over his mouth.

  “Helfen Sie uns bitte!” Sarah was crying. “Helfen Sie uns bitte!”

  Naomi saw men in their black clothing and hats running from their barns and yards and coming down the road as quickly as they could. She would get there well before any of them, but she had no idea what she should do.

  Get the bike off him. First of all, get the bike off him. God help us!

  She heard the sound of boots. Micah pounded past her faster than she had ever seen any man move. In seconds he was far ahead of her, the back of his black coat flapping. She had always been the quicker of the two, but she could not catch him.

  What has happened to you? Who are you now?

  Suddenly as she ran after him, for one long moment, everything around her changed. The melting snow was gone along with the mud and the chill in the air. The sun beat like a hammer on her back, and the glare off the sand and rock forced her to squint. Heat waves rose up from the ground, making Micah shimmer and the children at the accident scene waver and disappear. She couldn’t get her breath it was so hot, and the air stung the skin on her face and hands.

  What is this, Lord? Vas ist los?

  Micah was wearing a helmet and his army uniform with the desert camouflage. When had he changed clothes? He wore a pack on his back and carried a smaller one in his hand. His boots were the same color as the sand. In front of them, through the smoke, Naomi saw an armored vehicle lying on its side. Men were underneath it. Someone was yelling and yelling. She kept running.

  I don’t understand.

  She saw soldiers coming across the desert toward the dark smoke. They threw themselves to the ground as the sand erupted in front of them. She heard whining and zinging sounds but didn’t know what they were. In front of her, rocks and stones sprang into the air around Micah’s boots. A tear suddenly opened on his sleeve, and he spun sideways and staggered. But he quickly recovered and kept on running, crouching, smoke still boiling up black from the wreck of the army vehicle he was headed toward. She heard a loud cracking that w
as sharp and rapid.

  Gunfire!

  Now she understood Micah was running through a storm of bullets and she was right behind him. The armored vehicle had detonated a mine or been hit by a rocket, things Micah had told her about. He was the only soldier who was up on his feet. Others were hugging the desert floor and firing back at an enemy she could not see. A roar filled her head. A helicopter darted in, its machine guns spitting fire, turning the desert beyond the wreck into huge clouds of sand and dust. The wash from its blade and its speed ripped the kapp from her head and tore at all her hair, unraveling it, twisting it, tangling it. She fell to her knees, stones biting into her flesh.

  I cannot run anymore.

  But Micah kept on until he reached the wreckage. She watched him bend over one body after another. Blood had soaked through his left sleeve. She saw him take gauze and needles out of his pack. Bullets rang out on the steel on the burning vehicle. He ignored the near misses and continued to work on one of the wounded soldiers.

  You are doing this. You are the one doing this. No one else.

  “Naomi! Quick! I need your help!”

  Micah had pulled the bike off Timothy and thrown it to one side. She dropped to her knees by the boy. Micah grabbed her hands and clamped them down over a wound that was pumping blood under the shoulder.

  “You must use all your strength, do you understand?” He kept his voice calm. “You must control the bleeding. All right?”

  She stared at Timothy’s torn and damaged body and didn’t respond.

  “Omi.” His voice was quieter. “Listen to me. I need you to stop the bleeding. I’m going to take my hands away and deal with other things. You must keep up the pressure.”

  She blinked. “Ja.”

  “I’m taking my hands away. Are you pressing down?”

  “Ja.”

  “Hard?”

  “Ja, ja.”