What To Do?
In the next few weeks I will be posting a series of Wednesday Quotes to lay out a few basic principles and a concrete plan for stewardship in every household, since the household is where caring for people and caring for the natural world come together, naturally.
Transcending Mere Efficiency
In the noise of an efficiency and technology driven world, we find it difficult to hear and respond to what nature is saying. You can learn to listen and live in accord with a wisdom deep within reality.
Mending Broken Ties
Socio-economic practices push our interactions with the natural world toward bodily comfort and acquisitiveness, alienating us from our place in nature. By reconnecting with the natural world you can re-forge broken ties in your life.
Finding Our Place
We feel we’re missing something of being human in this world. If you find your place in stewarding nature, both giving and receiving, you fulfill both human nature and the order of the world around us.
Featured Posts:
Knowing Where Our Food Comes From
“A significant part of the pleasure of eating is one’s accurate consciousness of the lives and the world form which food comes.” Wendell Berry, “The Pleasures of Eating” in What are People For? There are very good reasons to consider where our food comes from. Let us...
Stewardship Plan for Everyone: Conserve, Beautify, Fructify
Stewardship is using the natural world carefully so that it thrives and thus serves human life well. The natural world provides food, cloths, and shelter, each with its proper delight and beauty. It can also form our mind and character, teaching us basic lessons of...
Every Household: The Home of Stewardship
“In the loss of skill, we lose stewardship; in losing stewardship, we lose fellowship; we become outcasts from the great neighborhood of Creation.” Wendell Berry, The Gift of Good Land “Old usage tells us that there is a husbandry also of the land, of the soil, of the...
Recent Posts:
Craftsmanship Vs. Money-Making
“...you thought that the shepherd as a shepherd tends the sheep not with a view to their own good, but like a mere diner or banqueter with a view to the pleasures of the table; or, again, as a trader for sale in the market, and not as a shepherd.” Plato, Republic Both...
To Be or Not To Be, a Craftsman
“And aren’t the respective crafts by nature set over them to seek and provide what is to their advantage?” Socrates, Plato’s Republic Rereading the first book of the Republic, I was struck by a bolt of lightning. Plato saw the root question of human life. To be or not...
A Time in Life for Pruning, Now
Before she comes, prune the vines. It is better this way. Hesiod, Works and Days The other day my wife and I were pruning our peach trees. According to Hesiod we were late—for the star Arcturus (the ‘she’ in the quotation) appears at the end of February. As Hesiod...
The Economics of Splitting Wood by Hand
*This is a reposting of the first piece I ever posted online, almost exactly eight years ago, at Front Porch Republic. It has remained one of the most popular I’ve posted. Also, here is short video sharing my joy in splitting wood. Hilaire Belloc once wrote that he...
A Plan for Winter: Receive the Gift of Slowdown
“We’ve gotten stuck in the summer mode, in chronic summer... In fall and winter we should move into a new mode, a contractive and restorative mode... like coming home at the end of the day... with a sense of settling, of slowing down, of peace, of belonging, of...
Knowing Where Our Food Comes From
“A significant part of the pleasure of eating is one’s accurate consciousness of the lives and the world form which food comes.” Wendell Berry, “The Pleasures of Eating” in What are People For? There are very good reasons to consider where our food comes from. Let us...
When Medicine Becomes a Business
“And it belongs to...the medical art to produce health, not to make money. Nevertheless, some men turn every art into a means of money-making, as if this is the end.” Aristotle, Politics The state of medical practice in our country and in the world has been brought...
Spending Large Sums Like an Artist
The magnificent man is like an artist; for he can see what is fitting and spend large sums tastefully. The magnificent man spends not on himself but on public objects. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics To examine with Aristotle the various virtues is an eye-opening tour...
Trees vs. the News
“Trees were the temples of the gods, and, following old established ritual, country places even now dedicate an outstandingly tall tree to a god.” Pliny the Elder, Natural History What we find in the news and social media tends to frame much of what we think about...
Corona Crisis: A Life Opportunity
“It was considered unpatriotic to hoard food.” It really struck me when my mother shared this memory from when she was a child during World War II. The war was an occasion for real soul-searching. Who am I, anyway? How is my life intertwined with that of others? How...
Stewardship Plan for Everyone: Conserve, Beautify, Fructify
Stewardship is using the natural world carefully so that it thrives and thus serves human life well. The natural world provides food, cloths, and shelter, each with its proper delight and beauty. It can also form our mind and character, teaching us basic lessons of...
Every Household: The Home of Stewardship
“In the loss of skill, we lose stewardship; in losing stewardship, we lose fellowship; we become outcasts from the great neighborhood of Creation.” Wendell Berry, The Gift of Good Land “Old usage tells us that there is a husbandry also of the land, of the soil, of the...