Amish Grace:
How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy
By Donald B. Kraybill, Steven M. Nolt, and David L. Weaver-Zercher
On October 2, 2006, a thirty-two-year-old gunman entered a one‐room
Amish school in Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania. Ordering the boys and other
adults to leave, the killer opened fire and shot the 10 remaining girls
execution-style, killing five and leaving the others critically
wounded. He then shot himself as police stormed the building.
Before the sun had set on that awful October day members of the Amish
community brought words of
forgiveness to the family of the one who had
slain their children. Those in the outside world were incredulous that
forgiveness could be offered so quickly for such a heinous crime. The
story of Amish grace eclipsed the story of violence and arrested the
world’s attention.
Amish Grace explores the many questions this story raises about the
religious beliefs and habits that led the Amish to forgive so quickly.
It examines forgiveness embedded in a separatist society and questions
if Amish practices parallel or diverge from other religious and secular
notions of forgiveness. It also asks why and how forgiveness became
international news. “All the religions teach it,” mused an observer,
“but no one does it like the Amish.”
