Bonnie Kristian, author of the recent Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community, has a well-researched piece at New York Times on Doug Mastriano’s connection to a conservative Mennonite church. Here is a taste:
Former President Donald Trump lost Pennsylvania in 2020 by just around 80,000 votes out of more than 6.9 million cast for president. This year, in the background of the state’s governor’s race — in which Attorney General Josh Shapiro is expected to best State Senator Doug Mastriano — there’s a tension playing out among an unlikely group of voters with the potential to change future elections there: the tens of thousands of Pennsylvania Amish, Mennonites and other Christians in related sects who have traditionally refrained from voting.
It is the unusual campaign of Mr. Mastriano — a retired army colonel involved in efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election — that has raised the possibility of an increased Amish vote in particular, starting with the white bonnets and Shenandoah beards that dotted the crowd at his primary victory party. Mingled among ordinary political revelers in campaign regalia, these plainer people may have been some variety of Amish or members of the CMC, a denomination formerly known as the Conservative Mennonite Conference, to which Mr. Mastriano himself has been repeatedly linked.
The candidate’s own religious beliefs have proved difficult to nail down. The Mastriano campaign has a practice of ignoring almost all media requests; the CMC congregation in question did not respond to my repeated requests for comment.
But a debate about political participation — once sharply limited or entirely forbidden by strong religious convictions about violence, power and the state — increasingly involves the Amish, Mennonite and related communities, conservative and progressive alike. A permanent plunge into politicking would be a major break with longstanding belief and practice for these Christians. It could also have long-term political implications for the whole country, beginning in Pennsylvania but in nearby Ohio, too.
The umbrella term for these groups is Anabaptist. The Amish and Mennonites are the best known. Some Anabaptists are Plain or Old-Order, known for their distinctive dress and low-tech lifestyles. Others, like the congregation I joined as a young adult uncomfortable with flag-and-country evangelicalism, wear modern clothing and happily use the internet.
Linking these groups are a handful of historical-theological distinctives, especially rejection of violence and coercive power as incompatible with the Christian life. Anabaptism doesn’t require adherents to be apolitical or as separate from mainstream society as the Amish have tended to be, though Anabaptists have generally avoided military service. Christians may not “employ the sword,” and it “is not appropriate for a Christian to serve as a magistrate,” declared the Anabaptist Schleitheim Confession of 1527. Jesus rejected political power and violence, the confession said, and so must his followers “so shall we not walk in darkness.”
Especially in the last decade, however, that tradition has begun to fray. Amish, Mennonite and other Anabaptist Christians are debating and practicing political engagement to a degree that once would have been unthinkable.
Mr. Mastriano’s possible ties to the CMC are a good case in point. An Associated Press photo of the victory party pictured the pastor of a CMC church where Mr. Mastriano’s wife, Rebbie, has reportedly held membership. People who appear to be Anabaptist appear in footage of campaign events where Mr. Mastriano has rallied alongside Mr. Trump and Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.
His candidacy has raised controversy among Pennsylvania Anabaptists, and the CMC, in its Statement of Practice, still officially rejects involvement in “any office, career or organization that requires us to employ the use of force, military service or retaliation to accomplish its objectives,” a traditional Anabaptist perspective.
Read the rest here.
RECOMMENDED READING
On Doug Mastriano’s 2001 paper “The Civilian Putsch of 2018” 
Where does Doug Mastriano go to church? 
More on Pennsylvania governor candidate Doug Mastriano’s affiliation with a Conservative Mennonite Church 
On January 6, 2021 there was violence on the House floor. Violence almost broke again on January 6, 2023
I think the official CMC statement represents the top leadership but not the laity… or at least not all of it. But being peace-loving, non-confrontational Chrisitans also means we (I’m Menno/Anabaptist) tend to be too lax in allowing things like nationalism, unChristlike political engagement, etc to fester.
But there’s also the perfidy of people like Mastriano who will pretend or coop the Menno/Anabaptist background or connections to gain political power… I’ve seen analogous (although not nearly so public) things play out before. Ex-menno/Amish or in-name only will say to the apolitical/non-political menno world, “hey, I came from you, I’m one of you, look – my last name! look I can speak PA dutch! – I support your values and that bad, Dem world out there is out to get you!” (I think my congressman Smucker probably plays this card frequently…)
Of course they never tell this crowd how much they actually hate and disdain amish/menno/anabaptist values – especially the simple lifestyle / mutual aid / nonresistance-pacifist values!) I’ve yet to meet many, if any ex-menno/amish people who don’t regularly mock and disparage these values… it is often part of the reasons they left!
Given Mastriano’s worship of the military, I’m going to assume that he’s secretly ridiculed and mocked these values, probably even while attending a church that officially supports and is guided by some of those values! Unfortunately he’s just one of many who are very active amish/menno-in-name or affiliation only… And if he gets the political power he wants and is able to commence his social engineering project like he hints at, he will have to persecute the amish/mennos who refuse to march to his drum, in order to be consistent with his ‘vision’ of a militarist ‘christian’ nation. (Thankfully, there are those too – I know many)