12/02/2018
THE WORLD and the things of this world generally do not provide an environment that fosters relationship with the God that created all we see in nature. I've found it right here on this land. I offer this prayer as a spiritual discipline for attuning to the land we care for.
LOVE is the nurturing care for growth. Caring for the land means caring about the land and not wanting to hurt it! The farm is not primarily a commodity, it is a community. A sustainable land care is rooted in affection, for the individual and the whole. Tending depends on tender love, in relationships with people and with the land. It also depends on fierce love that protects against violence and waste. If we do not love the place and its creatures, then we will not be the ones to offer sustaining solutions. We will not sustain what we do not love.
JOY is the passionate celebration of living things. A sustainable land care finds profound pleasure, and even humor, in the art of caring for the earth, caring for people, and sharing the surplus. Joy is the experience of love and begins to confuse work and play. Without joy, nothing is very satisfying.
PEACE is the moving rhythm of seasonal cycles. Instead of fighting, a sustainable land care is content to go with the flow of the place. It makes peace with land by ceasing all warfare language and activity. It keeps the peace of the place by maintaining order, of nutrient and water and carbon cycles, energy flows through differing levels, and the soil food web. Being content(at peace) means every moment of this journey is special.
PATIENCE is the attentive watchfulness for ripe moments. It is not a bored or complacent composure. A sustainable land care prepares for the ripeness of the season, both with crops and with change. Forcing the earth or the community ahead of their readiness only leads to bitterness, but it does everything within its power to cultivate the conditions we need. Patience doesn’t control the weather or social climate, because it can’t, but it endures and persists by strongly and actively shaping for the right time. A sustainable land care gives up perfectionism in favor of timely growth, rotations of rest, and the deep roots of perennials.
KINDNESS is the tender treatment that adapts to our kin. A sustainable land care treats everything in kind, as we might treat ourselves. Not treating everything in the exact same way, but in keeping with common kinds, particular characters, true to their nature. Kindness respects our kinship with and our likeness to other living creatures and their right to be fully themselves. Our care imagines what our soils, plants, and animals might feel like, because we know what it feels like to be grounded, to grow towards light and warmth, and to be hungry or fed. The land and its creatures are friends, and kindness treats them that way.
GOODNESS is God's promise of inherent blessedness of life. A sustainable land care confirms the dignity of living things. This place where we live and work is good as itself. Not from our engineering, not because of cheap real estate values, but as a place...THIS PLACE... that is part of the earth. Plant and build in ways that praise this goodness and make it visible. Once again, our care trades in perfectionism for the process of growth, acknowledging blemishes and wounds but loving anyway. Growth is good enough and, as a farmer friend often said, “Good enough is good enough.”
FAITHFULNESS is the ongoing commitment to cultivation and care. A sustainable land care commits to the place and trusts in the desire for life to grow itself. It is devoted to cycles and flows of life, loyal to loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, and good ways of relating. This care is also true to its word: not deceptive or misleading in what it does or grows or who actually does the work or how much it makes or doesn’t make growing. Faithfulness is reliable; as much as it’s up to itself, it’s not going anywhere because it’s given itself over in trust.
GENTLENESS is the soft touch that respects the goodness of all kinds. A sustainable land care looks for practices that nurture instead of control. It is compassionate toward limitations and makes changes gradually so that the land preserves the ability to heal itself. Show tenderness to the growth of soil and the flow of water. Gentleness is considerate, meaning both thoughtful and empathic. For the sake of care, a sustainable land care imagines how its actions might be felt. Everything responds to good treatment.
SELF-CONTROL is the honoring ability to make decisions for our lives and land. A sustainable land care is not privation, but the practice of plenty. It does not try to make a killing; it tries to make a living. Instead of maximizing production, it optimizes it by having enough. Another kind of self-control is the power to determine our lives, from saving seeds to resisting toxic wastes dumped near our homes to communal forms of ownership. A sustainable land care can be faithful to land because the caretakers are empowered to stay there, and it insists that those who "do the work", OWN the land and benefit from its abundance. This care honors hired hands by giving ownership to the caretakers that actually do the work but are denied the title of farmer like my partner Joe Lee. Self-control protects loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, and gentle ways of relating.
I GREW UP with 30 or 40 great men of God in my small town...many had a garden, and many of my friends were sons and daughters of farmers. Four of the six families down our dead end street had gardens. Our family did not, but I spent a lot of time with those individuals, and I'm so glad I did, and have not forgotten where I came from. So I found a place, embraced my neighbors and church, and my wife and I are blessed beyond our wildest imagination. It's easy now to exercise the fruits of the spirit.
