Why agrarians?
David Rice has been asking this question throughout his time at Mars Hill Graduate School. David is finishing up his MDiv degree and has been focusing on what the farmer and the earth have to teach us as pastors and ministers. Part of David’s work has culminated through a paper he wrote for Independent Study. Below is an excerpt:
What I wonder about though is the loss that is incurred when a people move in a certain direction, toward advancement and development, that causes them to choose new paths while forsaking some of the old ones. In a culture obsessed with innovation and advancement, it can be easy to forget the good that is still present in the old paths and ideas. What is lost, for instance, when eaters no longer want to purchase the lettuce that is grown on the family owned farm a few miles away because it costs a quarter more than what they can get at the supermarket? What is lost when, over time, that family farm cannot stay afloat because eaters ultimately value the single bottom line of short term economic value over the triple bottom line of long term economic, communal and environmental health? What is the cost of individuals and families forsaking the parish of their childhood for the mega-church community across town? What is the cost of a pastor who no longer cares for one hundred families in her neighborhood but who oversees an organization that ultimately cares for over one thousand families throughout her community? What is lost when local churches are consolidated into regional churches? And what is lost when pastors trade in their role of spiritual shepherd for organizational leader and manager? Put differently, what is lost when pastoral work becomes industrialized?
Pastors need to learn a different way of pastoring from someone who has not been conditioned by industrial culture to look at things from its perspective. Agrarian minded women and men are voices crying out in the mostly rural parts of our culture, speaking truth to the powers that be, those who run our culture from an industrial stance. Most of these folks are farmers who moonlight as writers and speakers. Some teach at seminaries, others raise grass and good soil. What they have in common is their ability to wade through the empty promises of industrial culture, those of progress, advancement and development, pick up a few good tricks along the way, yet mostly stick to their traditional ways of living, relating, and taking care of the earth.
David is a fourth year MDiv student and enjoys urban gardening cooking with his wife and new son.
