THE MENNONITE BROTHERHOOD IN RUSSIA (1789 - 1910), P. M. Friesen, 1911

bers unable to earn a living, find a home and are cared for. . . . Nevertheless, the deacons or leaders tire everywhere . . . installed to provide for the care of the poor in the congregation according to definite principles. Where it is deemed necessary, deaconesses are employed . . . in the larger congregations, and it is well-known that Pastor Fliedner § 18 ( 2 ) 70 DUTCH-PRU SSI AN ANABAPTISTS became acquainted with this arrangement in the Mennonite congregation of the Netherlands before he founded his deaconesses’ home in Kaiserswert. And furthermore, since home missions were being actively pursued in all the evangelical circles, the Mennonites everywhere participated in these activities, nor did they limit themselves to the confines of their own congregations (cf. Wichem— “Mennonites”). . . . Incidentally, many of the members of our German congregations also belong to the Gustav Adolphus organization. b) “Of particular importance in the area of home missions in our congregations was the itinerant ministry. Just as each individual congregation has the responsibility to care for each of its members, so the total brotherhood has a responsibility to those members who are far removed and without continual contact with a congregation. To serve these members various congregational groups arranged for an ‘itinerant ministry,’ sometimes choosing and supporting a travelling minister financially, who has the duty to visit the smaller congregations and isolated families, or sometimes commissioning the ministers of the established congregations to serve in this capacity by turns. . . . Aside from this, there exists a kind of voluntary travelling ministry [also called ‘guest ministry’] with us in Germany, as well as among our brethren in other lands, in that elders or ministers now and then pay visits to other congregations in order to preach there and get to know the brethren better or renew old acquaintances. Such visits were cultivated by the West Prussian congregations; in Russia [since the immigration], and more recently in America, they also frequently take place. At times someone may even make such a trip beyond the borders of his own country. . . . Thus now and then someone from West Prussia will travel to Russia and vice versa. . . .” c) Regarding Mennonite foreign missions see #300ff. At present the former missionary Nikolai Wiebe serves the West Prussian congrega- tions as "Missionary elder” ( 0305) in order to awaken interest in missions and serve the diaspora. d) Conferences and Associations. The present West Prussian congregations constitute [according to the 1888 Jahrbuch] a free association for the purpose of holding annual conferences which are regularly attended by nearly all the congregations. . . . The Mennonite congregations of the Palatinate and Rheinhessen already formed such an association some time ago, as has the “Badisch-Wuerttembergisch- Bayrischer-Gemeinde-Verband,” an