Sammlung ORG - Arnaud Mennonite Church fonds

Mennonites settled in the Ste. Elizabeth, Arnaud, and Dominion City areas in 1925. They met to worship in private homes and rented facilities when these became available. In 1929 it was decided to build a meeting house at Ste. Elizabeth. This was the first meeting house built by the 1920s Russian Mennonite immigrants in western Canada. Travel conditions and means made it difficult for the entire group to worship together at Ste. Elizabeth. So in 1944 another meeting house was built in Arnaud. The Mennonite Brethren families had already built a meeting house in Arnaud in 1935 so many of the other Mennonite families worshiped there until 1944. An attempt at remaining an equal congregation in the Lichtenauer Mennoniten Gemeinde did not work out so two independent congregations emerged after 1944, the Lichtenau Mennonite Church at Ste. Elizabeth and the Arnaud Mennonite Church. They did co-operate in some programmes such as the Jugendverein. For some major celebrations, such as the 40th anniversary of the settlement in 1965 the three congregations, Lichtenau, Arnaud M.B., and Arnaud M., celebrated together. The Arnaud Mennonite Church continued to survive after Arnaud M.B. congregation dissolved in 1980 and the Lichtenau congregation 1990.