An Essay on Catholic Homesteading
by Kevin
Ford
God the Creator
in his infinite goodness saw fit to place man in a Garden.
In the book of Genesis it is written, “The Lord God took
the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to till it and
keep it.” The original two duties of man were to till and
keep the garden, and man was meant from the beginning to
care for the created world to the best of his ability. Yet,
modern man has in large part forgotten his duty to care for
the earth in which he lives. The modern industrialized
society uses the earth for its own advantage, but with
little concern over what effect this use of the earth may
have upon the earth for future generations. God in his
Divine Providence gave man the ability to grow and tend
crops and flocks to serve as food and as means to most
other goods necessary for a family. In recent years God has
again enkindled in the hearts of some the desire to return
to the land. In recognition that a healthy society is built
upon the framework of healthy families, these men and women
seek to live a life worthy of the earth and one in which
they can raise children to be God-fearing worthy stewards
of this bountiful world in which they live. From the desire
to be worthy stewards of the earth has come what is often
called the “Catholic Homestead Movement.” This movement is
summed up in four parts: restoring the family as the basis
for society, being a worthy steward of God’s creation,
building community centered on the Catholic faith, and
simple living.
A homestead is a rural farm or home with some land on which
a family lives and provides for itself most all of the
goods it needs to live well. Some modern conveniences may
be kept, but often most all unnecessary items that are
commonplace in a modern home are absent in a homestead
household. This self-sufficient life on a Catholic
Homestead is not pursued out of some Pantheistic nature
worship, but rather out of a love and respect for the great
gift of Creation. Today’s industrialized society has often
failed almost completely in its stewardship of Creation.
Rather than keeping and tilling the garden, it has altered
what the garden will grow, abused the resources available,
and failed to distribute the goods in a just way. The
Catholic Homesteader seeks to restore the balance between
man and creation in some small way. This essay however is
not so much about what is wrong with industrialized
society, but rather what is right with the idea of
homesteading.
Historically, the rural family has been the basic unit of
society. For most of history, the rural family has made up
the majority of the population. However, in the past
century, there has been a dramatic and unprecedented switch
in population demographics concerning rural and urban
populations. For the first time in history, the population
of urban areas matches those of rural areas. In fact, the
United Nations has recently released a document that
estimates, “In 2008, the world reaches an invisible but
momentous milestone: For the first time in history, more
than half its human population, 3.3 billion people, will be
living in urban areas. By 2030, this is expected to swell
to almost 5 billion.” For the first time in history,
mankind will become more concentrated in the cities than in
the country if trends remain the same. One may ask why
there is anything wrong with the concentration of the
majority of the population in urban areas, but a look at
history will give a better understanding.
History tells us that most of the world, in fact 80-90%,
have lived in rural areas for most of recorded history.
These peoples worked on the land and thus provided for
their families, which was the basic goal of the father of
the family in his work. This leads to one of the basic
tenets of the Catholic Homestead Movement. The movement
believes along with the Catholic Church that the family is
the basic unit of society and that without healthy families
there is no healthy society. This is evidenced in most of
the modern industrialized societies of our day: without
families there is no society. Healthy families are built on
healthy husband and wife relationships, and it is the
belief of many homesteaders that all of these relationships
are built and maintained by the husband and father being
able to work at home along with the family. On a homestead,
the work of the father becomes the work of the family. The
family unit works as one, and as it is well attested,
working together creates solidarity amongst the members of
any group. Modern man is forced to work at a job where he
is most often separated completely from his family. His
work seldom has any meaning to his family other than that
by it he is able to provide money for the family. A
homesteading family is able to work together toward a
common goal. Modern man works alone without a particular
goal. He slaves away at a job which often subjects him to
meaningless petty tasks or hard manual labor which provides
no true sense of fulfillment. This leads us to another
important aspect of homesteading. The most basic tenet of
homesteading is to be a worthy steward of God’s created
Earth.
The first tenet of the movement is based upon man as a
worthy steward of creation. A steward is one who is
caretaker of something that does not belong to him, but
which he has a responsibility for. Industrialized Modern
Man is a very poor steward of Creation. He has lost
respect, reverence and awe for the greatness of the world
in which he lives. Many new methods of growing have greatly
increased production of goods, however with little concern
for the consequences of such methods. Many have recently
voiced their concern over gene-altered crops and hormone
filled livestock because they have realized the somewhat
untested nature of these projects that have become
commonplace in many supermarkets. To be a worthy steward of
creation is to continue the work of the Creator by subduing
the Earth. As the Catechism
of the Catholic Church states:
In the
beginning God entrusted the earth and its resources to the
common stewardship of mankind to take care of them, master
them by labor, and enjoy their
fruits.186
The goods
of creation are destined for the whole human race. However,
the earth is divided up among men to assure the security of
their lives, endangered by poverty and threatened by
violence. The appropriation of property is legitimate for
guaranteeing the freedom and dignity of persons and for
helping each of them to meet his basic needs and the needs
of those in his charge. It should allow for a natural
solidarity to develop between men.
The earth was
entrusted to man from the very beginning to keep and till,
and even now it is still entrusted to man. He is to take
care of it and it is the belief of the Catholic homesteader
that God has provided man with all the means necessary to
provide resources for the whole world. Altering crops and
using hormones is not the answer to the problems of
poverty, but rather it is a bandage that could cause even
greater damage by its effects. It is rather better to
promote a just distribution of goods for the sake of all
mankind rather than one country or people hoarding goods or
basing all economics only on money. To be a good steward is
to be able to live in the world and to make good use of its
goods by subduing the earth and providing for those in your
care, and then sharing excess with those in need.
The second tenet of the Catholic Homestead Movement is
restoring the family as the basic unit of society by
building strong families. This is done by having families
that work toward a common goal that is not focused on
money, but upon the common good of the entire family. Work
for many today has one purpose and one purpose only: to
earn money. However, Catholic homesteaders have a
dramatically different view of the purpose of work. In view
of the fact that God made man in “His image and likeness,”
we know that not only man has dignity but also his work
possesses dignity as part of man’s creation in God’s image
and likeness. As it is stated in the Catechism
of the Catholic Church:
Human
work proceeds
directly from persons created in the image of God and
called to prolong the work of creation by subduing the
earth, both with and for one
another.209
Hence work
is a duty: "If any one will not work, let him not eat."
Work honors the Creator's gifts and the talents received
from him. It can also be redemptive. By enduring the
hardship of work in union with Jesus, the carpenter of
Nazareth and the one crucified on Calvary, man collaborates
in a certain fashion with the Son of God in his redemptive
work. He shows himself to be a disciple of Christ by
carrying the cross, daily, in the work he is called to
accomplish. Work can be a means of sanctification and a way
of animating earthly realities with the Spirit of Christ.
The Catholic
Homestead movement seeks to build strong families firmly
rooted in Christian Tradition by living a life that allows
the entire family to be together rather than the husband
and father to be alienated and separated from the family by
a job that has no deep connection with the family. Blessed
Mother Teresa once said: “Everybody today seems to be in
such a terrible rush, anxious for greater developments and
greater riches and so on, so that children have very little
time for their parents. Parents have very little time for
each other, and in the home begins the disruption of peace
of the world.” It is the belief of many Catholic
Homesteaders that the modern breakdown of the family began
not when mothers began to leave the home to work, but
rather when fathers began to leave the home for work. Thus,
homesteaders desire a life where families can live and work
together toward a common goal which is not money as is the
case now, but rather toward the common good of the family.
As it was once said: “Maybe a person's time would be as
well spent raising food as raising money to buy
food.” Solidarity is built amongst the members of the
family as they spend more time together and are able to
work toward a common goal that benefits everyone involved.
This stands much in opposition to the modern father who
works separated from the family and then returns to a
family that then desires the fruit of his labor which comes
in the form of money. The father often feels used and
underappreciated because he has done all of the work only
to give away most all of what he has earned for the sake of
his family. In a homesteading family, the fruit of the
labor is a family that stands strong together as it works
toward its own well-being. Families are made strong again
so long as their work is rooted in the faith. Fathers of
families find deep meaning in their work because they no
longer work merely for money, but they see that the work
they do has a deeply significant meaning and importance for
the entire family.
The third tenet of the Catholic Homesteading Movement is
based upon community. The Church of Christ which subsists
in the Catholic Church has always upheld community as one
of the most important aspects of the faith. From the
earliest community in Jerusalem to the modern parish
community, the Church has seen with great wisdom the need
for man to not be alone. For as we know: “It is not good
for man to be alone. “ In community: “Man sharpens man as
iron sharpens iron.” Yet, many recent attempts at community
have suffered from two common errors. The first error is
that incorporated by Communism in which man loses his
identity and becomes merely a part of an economic system.
He is only a part of a whole that can be replaced at any
moment. The other extreme is the community that cuts itself
off from the world in order to create an illusion of a
utopia on earth. This denies the necessity of the Gospel
mandate: “Go out to all the world and tell the Good News.”
True community rooted in Christ is in constant need of
reform. Utopia cannot be built on Earth, but man can live
together and strive for holiness together. The Catholic
Homestead Movement seeks to build community amongst its
members by striving for holiness together. Several or even
many families of homesteaders may live in one place and be
able to build great community in which to raise their
children and instill in them the virtues needed to live a
holy and devout Christian life. Community is a vital and
integral part of homesteading life even if the community
does not consist solely of homesteaders. In this community,
each family should help the others by sharing and trading
of goods. The Catechism instructs man to regard those
things he owns not merely as his own, but also belonging to
others who may also need them. The Catechism states:
In his use
of things man should regard the external goods he
legitimately owns not merely as exclusive to himself but
common to others also, in the sense that they can benefit
others as well as himself. The ownership of any property
makes its holder a steward of Providence, with the task of
making it fruitful and communicating its benefits to
others, first of all his family. Homesteading
families living in community are able to live lives that
are rooted in Christ and motivated not by love of material
goods, but by love of neighbor. To share what you have been
given is, in fact, a duty of man that is rooted in his very
being.
The fourth and final tenet of the Catholic Homesteading
Movement is simple living. St. Elizabeth Ann Seton once
said: “Live simply so that others may simply live.” In an
age where materialism and consumerism threatens the very
soul of every Christian in developed nations, it has never
in history been so important to be a witness to Christian
poverty. Although poverty is not a virtue in and of itself,
it is a pathway toward many other virtues. Poverty is a
pathway on which we may walk where it is much simpler to
acquire virtues needed to live a good life. Christ says on
the Sermon on the Mount: “Blessed are the Poor.” He also
tells us that: “It is easier for a camel to pass through
the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the
Kingdom of Heaven.” Homesteaders embrace voluntary poverty
not because it is the only way to Heaven, but rather
because Christ points it out as the better and surer way.
Poverty is a means, not an end - just as simple living is a
means, not an end. It may in fact be sinful to give up
everything and then wonder why God is not providing.
Simplicity of life must be governed by holy prudence and
well discerned ideas. The married state of life requires
that parents provide appropriately for their children and
to live in destitution is not what the Gospel requires, but
rather a life governed by Gospel values rather than
Materialistic values. The measure of a man is not a measure
of how much he owns, his dignity does not derive from
things. His dignity derives from one thing: the fact that
he is made in God’s image and likeness. Simple living opens
man to a whole new reality that he becomes blind to when
obsessed with all the little details of modern living. As
John Burroughs once said: “To find the universal elements
enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be
refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter... To be
thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's
nest or a wildflower in spring - these are some of the
rewards of the simple life.” Simplicity opens the human
mind and heart to the glorious Creation of which man is a
part. Attention is given much less to the meaningless and
superficial elements of modern life, and simplicity opens
us to a whole new awe at the beauty of the created world.
The preceding essay was written in response to a call in
the heart of this particular author. A call that yearns for
simplicity and a way of living focused on God. In a World
focused on selfishness the Catholic Homestead Movement
offers a remarkable witness. The entire movement is focused
on restoring Creation back to the way it was meant to be,
as well as making the Church and society stronger by
building strong families in the midst of a supportive
community. Pope Benedict the XVI recently appealed to the
need for rural families to regain their place at the center
of society when he said: “The rural family needs to regain
its rightful place at the heart of the social order. The
moral principles and values which govern it belong to the
heritage of humanity, and must take priority over
legislation.” There is no doubt that the homesteading way
of life takes a tremendous amount of sacrifice, but it is
believed by many to be well worth the struggle. The joys of
such living and the great amount of satisfaction that comes
from such living are thought by many to far outweigh the
difficulties. To raise children full of virtue with a great
respect for Creation is a goal almost too great to imagine.
What a beautiful thought it is. May God bless you on your
journey toward Him. If you choose this route may these
words of Mother Teresa bring you face to face with the
Creator: “We need to find God, and He cannot be found in
noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See
how nature - trees, flowers, grass- grows in silence; see
the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in
silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.” May
the silence and peace of the homestead bring you to God.
The
Bible, RSV. Genesis 2:15
HYPERLINK
"http://www.unfpa.org/swp/2007/english/introduction.html"
http://www.unfpa.org/swp/2007/english/introduction.html.
Peering into the Dawn of an Urban Millennium.
CCC 2402
CCC 2427
Frank Clark
Genesis ?
Proverbs
Matthew
CCC 2404
Luke
Matthew
Pope Benedict XVI, World Food Day Address