We Understood ~ Mohammed Faris

“Not long ago, local farms and markets were the only source of food in one's life. We understood where our food came from, the ground in which it grew, and its link to our Creator. Today, however, with the globalisation of the food industry and the ever-increasing urbanisation of humanity, we've lost this link to the earth and forgotten our dependence on the Creator to provide food for us.”

~ Mohammed Faris

More at  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ProductiveMuslim

Artwork is a mural worked on by several artists. More at:

https://www.langleyadvancetimes.com/entertainment/collection-of-32-murals-to-be-unveiled-at-b-c-farm-museum-in-fort-langley-this-summer/

Overwhelmed by the Gifts~ Norman Wirzba

"To work in a garden is to be surrounded by the mysteries of germination, growth, and decay, and it is to be overwhelmed by the gifts of raspberries, tomatoes, and onions that surprise us with their fragrance and taste. But it isn’t all pleasantries. To garden is also to be frustrated by the disease and death that are beyond one’s control and power. Where did this blight come from? Why won’t this seed germinate? A late frost again? The temptation is always to give up and walk away. But that isn’t really a viable option. If people are to eat, they must eventually return to the ground.......

Gardening is one of the most vital practices for teaching people the art of creaturely life. With this art people are asked to slow down and calibrate their desires to meet the needs and potential of the plants and animals under their care. Gardeners are invited to learn patience and to develop the sort of sympathy in which personal flourishing becomes tied to the flourishing of the many creatures that nurture them. A garden, we might say, is a living laboratory in which we have the chance to grow into nurturers, protectors, and celebrators of life........ To garden well – in the skilful modes of attention, patience, sensitivity, vigilance, and responsiveness – is to participate in the way G_d gardens the world."

~ Norman Wirzba

More at 
https://www.theworkofthepeople.com/person/norman-wirzba

Artwork from Cath Read http://www.cathread.co.uk/

Our Door is Open ~ Philip Britts

"One of the best contributions of the school of organic farming to agriculture is this call for a genuine love of the land.......  But just as we do not believe that organic farming can find its full meaning outside the context of the whole of life, neither do we believe that an organic society can exist for itself, or have its only significance for the small group of people who are living it.

One of two things must happen. Either man will decline, through war, famine, disease, and the falling birth rate...  or we must learn to live peaceably together, in a society where the demand for wealth or position, ease or comfort, is supplanted by the just sharing of everything, and a free giving of strength and brains in service, not of self, but of the whole.

We do try to farm organically, but we see this as only a part of an organic life, and existing in the context of a search for truth along the whole line. This gives rise to social justice as brotherhood, to economic justice as community of goods. We see these conditions as the necessary basis for a true attitude towards the land and towards work. Therefore, our door is always open to all people who wish to seek a new way with us."

 ~ Philip Britts

More at  (a fascinating read),

https://www.plough.com/en/topics/culture/poetry/who-was-philip-britts-water-at-the-roots

Artwork; some talented artist provided us with this image, which is all over the internet, but their name is not attached anywhere that I can find.

The Smallest Quantity ~ Bill McKibben

“Lincoln said that cultivating even ‘the smallest quantity’ of ground bred freedom and independence. ‘Ere long the most valuable of all arts, will be the art of deriving a comfortable subsistence from the smallest area of soil. No community whose every member possesses this art, can ever be the victim of oppression of any of its forms. Such community will be alike independent of crowned-kings, money-kings, and land-kings.” 

~ Bill McKibben

More at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_McKibben

Artwork from John Augustus Walker
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Augustus_Walker

Which we Belong ~ Aldo Leopold

“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.” 

~ Aldo Leopold  

More at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldo_Leopold

Artwork from Walt Curlee 
http://www.waltcurleeart.com/walt-curlee-bio-page.html

Born of Dust ~ Daniel Stulac

"We are, quite literally, born of dust. But that does not mean we are only dust. Filled with the breath of G_d, we have a special vocation, too – to serve the garden in which G_d placed us, and to keep it well. As dust of the earth, we are created to be servants of the soil. We are creatures designed by G_d to have our hands dirty. We are intended for cultivation. We are here as the keepers, the pruners, the grafters, the midwives, and the husbands of G_d’s planet. We are of creation, and we are for creation."

~ Daniel Stulac

More at http://www.ecotheo.org/author/daniel-stulac/

Pulsing with Sentience ~Joel Salatin

"All of creation is pulsing with sentience: when the sunflower tracks the sun across the sky, when the maple tree withholds its sap in a windstorm so that if a big branch falls it will have enough sap to run to the wound. Appreciating these things elevates our reverence, awe, and wonder to a higher plane. When you kill something on a video game, you wait five seconds and it gives you a new icon. But when you go out to the garden and the tomato plant is dead, that’s it. The gravity of that situation helps to create a frame of reference to how we interact with each other. Sometimes we become so disconnected that we don’t have a frame of context for what true sacrifice is....

As people become more disconnected, they become disempowered. At the same time, government agents and the bureaucracy is addicted to this manipulative attitude: oh, we can just manipulate the market and health, as opposed to realizing that, fundamentally, we are very, very dependent and this is the posture that G_d wants us to have. It is the mutual dependency; a servant’s heart toward each other. When our hands are in the soil, when we are actually thinking about our dependence on air, soil, water, microbes, and the magnificence of life, it gives us a better perspective on what is at our fingertips. It makes us a little more humble and a little less manipulative, and a little more appreciative of other people’s abilities, gifts, and talents. I think that is true diversity."

More at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joel_Salatin

Artwork from Eric Ravilious

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Ravilious

Need to be Grounded ~Craig Jensen

"I believe that good farming, like good teaching, is long-term activism. Farming and teaching are both optimistic vocations: they assume not only that there can be a future for humans on this planet, but that there should be and that our work can make that future world better. Good farmers work hard to build and balance their soils. We value the complex, often unseen, web of life all around us, allowing for sustainable yields over a very long time...... A good onion harvest this season won’t end a war, but providing access to healthy food healthfully grown—and the nourishing relationships that often accompany it—may be part of the foundation for the world we want. Work towards this aim might ultimately subvert the causes of war and continuing conflicts. Farming and community are an active yes to peace, and I believe that living a yes is a very strong way to say no to war.

Participation in rural life can be lonely, and the work of farming can be physically and emotionally overwhelming. An isolated life could set me in ruts or into self-pleasing patterns as easily as it could keep me rightly aimed toward peace. So I know that my life and farm need to be grounded by the joys, challenges, and accountability of community. Living in close, committed relationship with other people is one of the most radical acts of love and peace that we can make in our lives."

~Craig Jensen

More at https://www.friendsjournal.org/farm-community/

Artwork from Paul Gauguin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Gauguin

One Solution ~Bill Mollison

"There is one, and only one solution, and we have almost no time to try it. We must turn all our resources to repairing the natural world, and train all our young people to help. They want to; we need to give them this last chance to create forests, soils, clean waters, clean energies, secure communities, stable regions, and to know how to do it from hands-on experience."

~Bill Mollison

More at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Mollison

Artwork by Jane Dignum https://www.janedignum.com/

Beneath Our Feet ~ William Bryant Logan

“We spend our lives hurrying away from the real, as though it were deadly to us. “It must be somewhere up there on the horizon,” we think. And all the time it is in the soil, right beneath our feet.” 

~  William Bryant Logan

More at http://williambryantlogan.com/about/

Artwork from Louise Stebbing http://www.westnorfolkartists.org/louisestebbing/index.htm

Small Gifts ~ 'Andrew'

"The slow, steady work of putting my hands in the ground, the mystery of what happens underneath the soil, the curious surprise of discovering a bright red tomato on the vine…these things are conditioning me, forming me into a particular type of person. I’m learning to see the bits of divinity dripping from these small gifts, wonderful and awesome in their complexity. I believe Richard Rohr when he says that God is constantly trying to give away parts of God’s self–we just fail to develop the patience to learn how to look for it."

~ 'Andrew' from Oakleaf Mennonite Farm

More at https://oakleafmennonitefarm.wordpress.com/2013/06/30/learning-to-pay-attention/

Artwork from Stephen Noble http://www.stevennoble.com/main.php

Affirms the Goodness ~ David J. Clark

"I believe very strongly: that farming is a liturgical act (at least it is when one is farming well – which, in my case, is less often than ought to be the case). And, like any good liturgy, it is a liturgical act the significance and meaning of which only slowly reveals itself. I don’t even understand most of what I am saying and what gestures I am making before God when I am participating in this liturgy of field and forest. There is this much, though, that I am sure of – I can feel it in the work: Good farming affirms the goodness of God, it  of all creatures great and small, it affirms the goodness of man, and of the human body, and of what Tolstoy affectionately called “the brotherhood of all men” and of what Wendell Berry calls “the community of creation”. And it does more than affirm: without even intending to, you very often find that you are engaged in an act of gratitude. I am not talking about the feeling of gratitude. You find that the work of farming just is gratitude."

~ David J. Clark

More at

 http://www.patheos.com/blogs/fareforward/2014/02/christian-commitment-symbolism-and-farming/

Artwork from Gwenda Morgan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwenda_Morgan

Never the Same ~ Redeeming the Dirt

"When I rise early in the morning the waking dawn is just breathtaking. Doing the chores is satisfying as well as great exercise. Basically what I get to do is go around and make the animals happy. Give them feed, fill their water, move their shelters, etc., and when they are happy, my job is done. My daily work on the farm is never the same and changes with the seasons. There are somewhat hard jobs, like processing chickens, setting out thousands of transplants, or working in the heat of the summer. But they don’t last forever and I can finish and move on to something else. There is always something to look forward to. Looking forward to planting the first seeds in spring. Looking forward to harvesting the first crops of summer. Looking forward to the cooler weather of fall. Looking forward to the rest and projects of winter. And the majority of the time I am at home and get to eat every meal with my family, as well as work with them. Almost every day I find myself falling more in love with farming."

~ "Redeeming the Dirt"

More at http://www.redeemingthedirt.com/what-is-redeeming-the-dirt/

Artwork from Winslow Homer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winslow_Homer

Quiet Joy ~ Willis D. Nutting

"The opportunity for real, soul-satisfying work, so rare in our day, is found abundantly in rural living. Here a man can make long-range plans and can carry them out without exploiting his fellow man; for the things that he uses are things that exist to be used: soil, plants, animals, building materials, etc. he can live a whole life of work without once using another man as a mere means for carrying out his plans. And neither does he become a tool of someone else. With the materials at hand he can employ the splendid coordination of mind and hand to create something of value for his family. He can fulfill his real nature in real work. And this work is much more joyful than any mere recreation. As a matter of fact this work carries with it its own recreation, so that the man who works does not have to worry about how he is going to have his good times. The work itself is a good time even though it be hard. There is a joy in toil which the football player knows not. It is a quiet joy that comes from the knowledge that one has accomplished something, something of real value, and that the accomplishment is his own."

~ Willis D. Nutting

More at http://ethicscenter.nd.edu/about/inspire/great-figures/willis-d-nutting-1900-1975/

Artwork from Adrian Feint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_Feint

Skills and Craft ~ Gene Logsdon

“Sustainable farms are to today's headlong rush toward global destruction what the monasteries were to the Dark Ages: places to preserve human skills and crafts until some semblance of common sense and common purpose returns to the public mind.”

~ Gene Logsdon

More at https://thecontraryfarmer.wordpress.com/

Artwork from Sybil Andrews https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sybil_Andrews

Two Steps from the Dirt ~ Kristin Kimball

"Maybe most important, farm food itself is totally different from what most people now think of as food: none of those colorful boxed and bagged products, precut, parboiled, ready to eat, and engineered to appeal to our basest desires. We were selling the opposite: naked, unprocessed food, two steps from the dirt.” 

~ Kristin Kimball

More at (in fact so much more, Kristin and Mark's blog is outstanding)
http://www.kristinkimball.com/blog/

Artwork from Stephen Alcorn http://www.alcorngallery.com/

We are of the Same Stuff ~ Oakleaf Mennonite Farm

"Maybe it is the connection between our bodies and the soil. Scripture tells us that this tie is more than intimate.  We are made from earth, it says.  We are of the same stuff. So when we work in the soil and get it under our nails and all over our clothes, there is good reason that we recognize the link.  It’s not imaginary, it’s really there. When we tend the garden, we are tending to another part of ourselves and when we grow food for the sake of others we are loving them as God loves us – creating for them, providing for them, for our neighbors, our brothers and sisters."

~ Oakleaf Mennonite Farm

More at https://oakleafmennonitefarm.wordpress.com/2014/03/10/something-holy-an-ash-wednesday-reflection/

Artwork from Rob Barnes http://www.robbarnesart.co.uk/

Things that are Good ~ William Penn

“But agriculture, says he, is especially in my eye. Let my children be husbandmen and housewives. This occupation is industrious, healthy, honest, and of good example. Like Abraham and the holy ancients, who pleased God, and obtained a good report, this leads to consider the works of God, and nature of things that are good, and diverts the mind from being taken up with the vain arts and inventions of a luxurious world.”

~ William Penn

More at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Penn

Artwork from Walt Curlee
 http://www.waltcurleeart.com/WRC-RuralAmericanaSeriesMountainLandscapeOilPaintings.html

Cultivation and Perfection ~ Masanobu Fukuoka

“When it is understood that one loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them, the essence of natural farming will be realized. The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings.”

― Masanobu Fukuoka

More at  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masanobu_Fukuoka

Artwork from Andy English http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_English

Another Way of Life ~ Claudio Oliver

"We called ourselves 'urban farmers' not because it sounded trendy, but because that was the best way we found to express our loyalty to the God of creation. We have no loyalty to the false god called 'market' and its mediator 'money'. Through gardening and composting, we create a new relationship with animals and plants: we are affirming another way of life, where the  rhythms and balance of creation can express the freedom the Creator has promised us."

~ Claudio Oliver

More at http://www.plough.com/en/ebooks/qr/plough-quarterly-no-4

Artwork from Peter Nevins http://www.peternevins.com/