Spirituality for a Web of Life

La Crosse Diocesan Rural Crisis Day

Brother David Andrews, CSC
Executive Director
National Catholic Rural Life Conference

Thank you for inviting me to share with you today as the Executive Director of the National Catholic Rural
Life Conference. We are celebrating 75 years of work on behalf of rural people everywhere. We appreciate
the strong leadership provided by our President, your Bishop Raymond Burke.

____We live in a matrix, a web of interrelated parts which includes the landscape (natural and built), the
economy, the social dynamics, the culture and the religious character of a region. Landscapes differ from
Maine to California, from Alaska to Florida. The landscapes shape a mode of making a living, an
economy. In his book, Topics in Education, the late Canadian philosopher Bernard Lonergan points to
three major determinants of local communities and regional communities. "The influence of geography is
one great determinant in what the mode of living will be. There is also the technological and economic
determinant: the way people work, the tasks they have to perform in their way of life. Finally, there is the
influence of heredity and historical memories, their culture, their religion.". Because the determinants
include the external determinants of nature, the determinants that come from the mode of subsistence, and
the determinants that come from the memories of the past and the tradition, the expressions of values in a
religion and in stories, these elements are realized together and form a single whole, an organic way of
living: a "web of life."


That web of life might be:

A Yankee New England village centered on a green; thirty miles from Boston.

A French ranch service town in Wyoming; 50 miles from Caspar.

A Cajun fishing village in Louisiana; south of Baton Rouge and southwest of New Orleans.

A small dairy farm community in the Wisconsin countryside, not far from La Crosse.

A small Latino family farm town in northern New Mexico, east of Santa Fe.

A German hog farm region in western Ohio, south of Toledo, northwest from Dayton.

The Jubilee Tradition: Millennial Images of the Web of Life

As we look forward to the year 2,000, the Millennium, it wouldn’t hurt for us to be reminded that the
underpinnings of much of Christianity are from an agrarian culture. In fact, much of American culture has
an underpinning from agrarianism. Look at the influence of country music wherever you go in these
United States. Think carefully too, how little children are brought up in almost every home: we play with
our babies by singing "Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool." We play with the toes of babies and
count: "This little piggy went to market, this little piggy stayed home." We teach animal sounds: "What
does the doggie say?" What does the horse say? What does the cow say? What does the duck say?" Our
stories are those of Jack and the Beanstalk, Jack and Jill fetching their pail of water. So the undertow of
our human formation is characterized by a distinct rural character, even when the parents shop at a nearby
deli in the heart of Manhattan, have FlavrSavr tomatoes wrapped in plastic and cellophane, never are
exposed to cows, horses or pigs. The preparation of our children almost universally is for an agrarian
culture, and yet many if not most children’s experiences are devoid of realism. As the poet T.S.Eliot once
wrote: "We’ve kept the symbol, but lost the experience." So it is with agrarianism for many American
people.

____The scriptures too, like American culture, are replete with rural imagery. It goes without saying to
admit that this is so. It is helpful then, to recall that much of the experience of Israel is in an agrarian
context. The Jubilee tradition of Israel helps to focus that fact for us. The initial experience of God by the
Hebrew people is that God is the one who hears the cry of the poor. God, the Lord Yahweh is revealed: "I
have seen the affliction of my people."

____During a time of political threat, in the 7th and 8th centuries, the scribes gathered together the
stories of Israel’s heritage as a rural people--in idealized form these found expression as The Jubilee
Tradition. The Jubilee Tradition was gathered to help Israel’s people remember their heritage as a people in
the consciousness of the possible loss of their land and their way of life. The land is a sheer gift, requiring
no military or diplomatic effort on the part of Israel. The land is gift, not something to be owned or
captured. It is God’s original blessing.

____The Jubilee Tradition expresses the notion of the Sabbath in the ecological, social, political, and
religious organization of Israelite society. The Jubilee Tradition was the extension of the notion of the
Sabbath--the rest of the seventh day in praise of God--to the total life of the Hebrew Community. It was
a social program -- a model-- for the ongoing conversion of the life of an entire people. It included these
following elements:

____ l) Leaving the soil fallow.

____2) Remission of debts.

____3) Return to each individual of family property.

____4) Liberation of slaves

____The Jubilee tradition expresses an ideal form for an agrarian people and is a model for all people’s
renewal in striving to live with care for creation and for community.

____In Luke’s Gospel, most especially, the Jubilee Tradition articulates the mission and goal of Jesus.
In the synagogue, in the town of Nazareth, Jesus expresses his mission:

____"God has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. God has sent me to proclaim release to
captives; the recovery of sight to the blind, to proclaim the acceptable Year of Yahweh."

____This Jubilee notice fit in with Jesus’ understanding of the Kingdom as similar to the prophetic
understanding of the Jubilee. Jesus was the bearer of a new, in fact, a renewed vision of human, social,
economic, political and ecological relationships. Earliest Christianity began as a renewal movement within
Judaism. The Jesus movement was fostered by tax collectors, fishermen, poor and marginalized persons.
They became the authorities of local communities. It began in the countryside. It was a Galilean
movement. We hear a great deal about farmers, fishermen, wine growers and shepherds.

____At the heart of the Jubilee Tradition is an appreciation of agrarianism, of a balanced social order
where community and creation matter more than money, efficiency, power, command and control
operations. We are talking about a culture, a way of life, not simply a business. It gave attention to a
society focused on fostering a culture committed to the common good, care for the land and social
solidarity. It stands as a model, an ideal for our serious consideration today. Geography, economics,
society, culture and religion are seen as an integrated whole in the Jubilee Tradition. The Jubilee Faith
exemplifies an appreciation of the relationship between social and natural ecology. It captures well the
insight: "the web of life is one."

____In this web of life, in the La Crosse diocese where the diocesan leadership is gathered today to deal
with the rural crisis, we can appreciate the challenges we face together. As leaders in educational
institutions we can recognize our call in the apostolic constitution on higher education, Ex Corde Ecclesiae,
to work for regional collaboration in defense of local cultures and in defense of nature. This is a significant
call in that important document, one which we would do well to heed here in the diocese of La Crosse.

____Those of us in the health community recognize well the challenges we face in "managed care.
" There are similar challenges in "managed food" where vertically integrated companies control the food
process from seed to shelf. Such control is by a few transnational corporations more concerned about the
profits they make for a few than the common good of the many. The Center for Disease Control has stated
that in the continued industrialization of agriculture food-borne illnesses have made a dramatic increase.
Thus we need to reflect carefully on how our food is produced, who controls the food chain, how safe is
our food. Increasingly we need to work on a food system which joins urban and rural consumers with the
rural producers. Increasingly we can look at our own food purchasing practices and make a contribution to
our local food production processes. How many of us buy locally? Do we participate in community food
programs. Our commercial kitchens and hardware in our convents, rectories, parish halls might be used
for food processing or for direct marketing to consumers by farmers. We need to experiment with a variety
of food marketing ventures including using our parking lots for farmers’ markets.

____Food is a unique entity, it is not like other commodities. Its producers work close to the earth. Our
religious heritage makes it significant by talking about "fruit of the vine" and "work of human hands." I’m
sure that as a local people of God, this local church does care about the marketplace. We, the Church of La
Crosse, care about the home. We care about who has roast beef, as we care about the poor, those who
have none. And, we are not individualists but have a sense of the common good, are members of a
community of faith, and so we say not I, but we, we, we, we all the way home.

Thank you.