What is the difference between Mennonites and Amish?
More than 150 years after Anabaptism first took hold in central Europe, Mennonite pastor Jakob Amman led a reform movement that eventually took his name. Larger North American society tends to lump “Mennonites” and “Amish” together but in fact, though they come from the same roots in the 16th-century Anabaptist reform movement, they are two different groups. The Amish share with Mennonites the essential beliefs described above but obviously – especially the Old Order Amish who drive horses and buggies, plow with horses or mules, have no electricity or land-line telephones in their homes and dress distinctively – have chosen to live differently than the majority of Mennonites, who in personal appearance and lifestyle would be hard to distinguish from most people in the larger society. The largest groups of Amish in North America today are in Pennsylvania, Ohio and northern Indiana although Amish communities can be found in many other states, including one in Reno County, Kan., near Hutc
