If you dress Plain, I’m quite sure you will be familiar with her website. If you are exploring the whole concept of Plain as a different spirituality, you may never have heard of her – and if that’s the case, I encourage you to take a look. Her website is a mine of information about both the body and the soul of Plain – everything from the call of Christ that underlies it to the best place to get a Piker bonnet online.
Ibbie Penraeth is a remarkable woman. She would come into my category of Prophetic Enactor, I think. She is sweet and gentle in face and manner. Actually, it’s not all sweetness; when I look carefully at her photograph, I almost see that nose twitch like a squirrel’s – there’s something pointy and mischievous there like a little fox out to play. Anyway, I like Ibbie Penraeth. She has the wisdom of an older woman than she is, and her counsel is kind and encouraging as well as wise.
But the thing I admire about her most is her tenacity. It is wearying being different – even if you just are so that’s all you’ve ever known. Ibbie has come in for more than her fair share of censure and criticism for this testimony that Christ has called her to. ‘Just give them the bonnet,’ she says of folks who stare in the street – she uses the wide brim like the blinkers of a horse, to keep her eyes on the path she has set herself and shut out the unhelpful distraction of curious, bemused or disapproving eyes. Her website includes a fascinating and helpful page about the opposition she has encountered. She also defines Plain dress as a koan, a way of looking at it that finds an immediate resonance in my understanding.
This Plain way is easy to start, it’s the perseverance that is the thing, I can see that clearly. It is a vocation, and every vocation has a desert stretch. Ibbie sticks to it, and advises and encourages the rest of us; it’s an encouragement of itself just knowing she’s there, going determinedly on. I love her perseverance and tenacity.
The other thing I love about Ibbie is why she began her Plain dress witness. Not because she was born into a Plain church so she was brought up that way, so not because it would have been awkward for her to do otherwise. She had neither upbringing nor example to lead and support her in it. It was just that Christ asked her to do it, and so she did. Sooner or later, I think even if you are born and bred Amish or Old Order Mennonite, you would have to come to that place for it to be the true testimony of your heart; Ibbie’s starting place.
Why do you wear that headgear, that great voluminous dress, those sturdy boots? Because the Lord asked it of me – and every day I do it I see more of why.
God bless Quaker Jane. She is a soul fair and lovely.