The Spirit of the Machine vs. The Spirit of Truth

I recently hosted a retreat with 30+ college students at my farm.  These young men spent a week in work, prayer, and rest, with an intentional focus on building Christian brotherhood and character.  Because so few had experienced work their new callouses bled and...

The Fact of Food: Eating as the Basis of Culture

Something has gone wrong with our culture, or at least it seems that way by how many people make a living criticizing it, trying to fix it, or checking out of it altogether.  That last one is impossible, but it makes a good story.  Just consider how many institutes,...

Tending Trees When the Church is Dark

In Wendell Berry’s book The Unsettling of America he has a short but powerful little commentary on The Odyssey. He’s describing the disarray of Ithaca, Odysseus’s home and kingdom. With Odysseus gone for so long, there are men eating up the stores of food, with...

How work brings meaning back to Family Life

Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo is often called the beginning of contemporary Catholic social teaching because it was the first encyclical to deal with the unprecedented disruptions of traditional societal order due to the industrial revolution.  For fathers, Rerum is one of...