Money or Tradition: Ind. Amish Face Uneasy Dilemma

A part-time construction job sturdied Orva Fry's financial foundation after he was laid off from an RV factory. It also kept the 41-year-old Amish father of two on steady spiritual ground.

In this April 17, 2009 photo, a bicyclist goes past a downtown mural in Nappanee, Ind. The Amish,...

In this April 17, 2009 photo, a bicyclist goes past a downtown mural in Nappanee, Ind. The Amish, like everyone else in these troubled times, are struggling to make ends meet. The Amish settlement in northern Indiana is the third largest in the nation behind settlements in Ohio and Pennsylvania. The Indiana settlement sprawls across Elkhart and LaGrange counties, which both have unemployment rates of 18 percent. (AP Photo/Joe Raymond)

(AP)

Another way to make ends meet that Fry briefly considered — unemployment checks — went against his faith, which shuns all forms of government assistance.

That Fry even pondered signing up for jobless benefits illustrates a marked shift in the nation's third-largest Amish settlement, which is suffering steep unemployment following a decades-long shift from farming to factory work. Church and economic leaders say a growing number of the area's 23,000 Amish are breaking with centuries of tradition and taking government help to stay afloat.

Fry chose not to take jobless benefits and was called back to work at the RV factory in March after working alongside his brother for three months repairing a fire-damaged home. But the community pressure to adhere to this tradition is easing amid the worst recession in decades.

Bishops who once might have censured those who sought public assistance are reluctantly looking the other way.

"We prefer to supply ourselves, but I told people that if they have no other option and no other way to make ends meet then they can take it," said Paul Hochstetler, bishop of an Amish district east of Goshen.

The unemployment rate in the Elkhart-Goshen metropolitan area approached 19 percent in March — the most recent month for which data are available — in large part due to the misfortune of recreational vehicle factories that have laid off thousands of workers. It is the country's fourth-highest unemployment rate and is up 13 points from March 2008, the largest increase in the U.S.

The Amish's refusal to take assistance such as unemployment and welfare is shared by like-minded Anabaptist traditions that grew out of 16th century German sects that sought to separate themselves from the world, said John Farina, an associate professor of religious studies at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va. That would include Hutterians, the Church of the Brethren and the Church of the United Brethren.