Justice Movie Nights & Potluck!

By Frank Lesko, Coordinator of Justice and Peace

One thing is true about Jesus is that he was never far from food.  In fact, he brings the party when other options have failed—turning water into wine and a few loaves and fishes into a bounty to feed the multitudes.  While there are spiritual implications to these stories, it goes without saying that Jesus is known in the breaking of the bread.  Each Mass we come together at the table to remember.  Our table fellowship is a chance to draw us into deeper communion with him.

To follow his example, it only makes sense that we continue the tradition of gathering in his name for fellowship, food and fun.  The Franciscan Care of Creation kicked off this series in November with a bountiful dinner and lively discussion of the film A Sense of Wonder about Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring, the book that launched the environmental movement in the United Sates 50 years ago.

The Justice and Peace office is working with many of our ministry groups to sponsor Justice-themed movies on the 2^nd Friday of each month in the Cupertino Room.  Join us for a potluck dinner at 6:00 PM with a movie starting around 7:00 PM and a discussion afterwards!  All opinions and viewpoints are welcome as we greet these issues in mutual respect and openness.

Here is the schedule as it is shaping up so far.  Some details are subject to change:

January 11:  Hurricane Sandy recently devastated much of the American northeast, and scientists have largely blamed the severity of this storm on human-influenced climate change.  The Franciscan Care of Creation ministry would like to invite the parish into a discussion about global climate change and food security.  What impact will this have and what can we do about it?

February 8:  The Justice Theater Project will continue the dialogue about what it means to be a faithful citizen.  The dinner will be a chili cook off!  Winners will receive tickets or merchandize from the Justice Theater Project.  We will show a screen version of Julius Caesar with a discussion of politics, power and faith in preparation for the stage version that will begin the following weekend.

March 8: No movie due to other Friday Lenten activities on campus!

April 12:  Most justice organizations agree that the political climate is ripe to see a change on US immigration policy.  The Diocese of Raleigh, Holy Name Province and many other organizations are calling for education and action on behalf of undocumented immigrants.  The Committee for Immigration Justice will host the movie Harvest of Empires which discusses the root causes of undocumented immigration.

May 10:  The Fair Trade Ministry will be the host in recognition of International Fair Trade Day which is later that month.  Samples of fair trade chocolate, coffee and other goodies will be served along with the potluck!  Speakers from local fair trade organizations will be present to lead our discussion on what fair trade means and how it touches the lives of so many people around the world.

Please stay tuned to developments in the Justice Movie and Potluck schedule by clicking on the Justice and Peace Icon on the parish homepage:

http://stfrancisraleigh.wordpress.com/pastoral-ministries-overview/justice-and-peace/

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Lent Week 2: Food

By Sheila Read

We pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.” But how often do we think about where our bread comes from? When we eat this bread, we are connected to the soil that nourished the wheat and the water that fell on the grains. Eating is an act of communion with the Earth.

Our food choices directly affect the health of God’s creation. But the global agricultural system has resulted in a food system so complex that the fundamental connection between our land, water and food is obscured. In the name of convenience and cheap food, the industrial food system engages in practices that upon examination are seen to degrade the Earth through waste, pollution and inhumane treatment of animals.

Consider waste of energy. The average fruit or vegetable travels 1,500 to 2,500 miles from where it is grown before it reaches your plate. Agricultural operations are the biggest polluter of rivers and lakes, degrading water with topsoil, chemical fertilizers, pesticides and animal waste. North Carolina’s Neuse River, contaminated with hog waste and runoff of fertilizers from farms, in 2007 was named the 8th most endangered river in the United States by the nonprofit conservation organization American Rivers.

I finally gave up eating meat from animals raised in Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) after reading in Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma about the filthy, crowded conditions in which cows and chickens are raised.

Church Teaching

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in a 2003 document discusses the moral implications of food production. “Food sustains life itself; it is not just another product,” the bishops wrote in For I Was Hungry and You Gave Me Food: Reflections on Food, Farmers and Farmworkers. On CAFOs, the bishops said, “We believe that these operations should be carefully regulated and monitored so that environmental risks are minimized and animals are treated as creatures of God.”

The Catholic Church teaches that humans were entrusted by God as stewards of his creation and have a moral duty to be good stewards of the land. Popes John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have both made clear that stewardship does not mean license to do as we please with the Earth and its creatures. In his 2010 World Day of Peace Message, Pope Benedict said:  ”Natural resources should be used in such a way that immediate benefits do not have a negative impact on living creatures, human and not, present and future… [and] that human activity does not compromise the fruitfulness of the earth, for the benefit of people now and in the future.”

Changing the way we eat involves some sacrifice, especially of the convenience of pulling whatever we want off of the grocery store shelf without considering where it comes from or how it was produced. In a culture preoccupied with obtaining more material things, sacrifice is often considered to be a dirty word. But during Lent, we are called to embrace sacrifice as a way to remind us that our primary relationship is with God. Thoughtful sacrifice reminds us that our love of God and neighbor is a far higher standard than that of convenience.

Community Garden – Local and Organic

Last year, St. Francis parishioners created a community garden here on campus, motivated by the desire to learn how to grow food locally and organically. The Franciscan Care of Creation ministry began planning for the garden after the shock of the Gulf Oil Spill dramatically illustrated the consequences of our dependence on oil.

“We believe local food is far more in tune with the message of taking care of the Earth, as we need in any way, shape or form to cut back on the use of petroleum,” said Pat Kelly, who coordinates efforts in the garden. In addition, growing vegetables using organic practices avoids the harmful health effects of pesticides and the contamination of water supplies by chemical fertilizers (which also are derived from petroleum).

The garden became a fun family activity, where parishioners learn together how to grow plants organically from seed to harvest. Last year the garden donated more than 500 pounds of produce to the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle.

Taking Action

The Earth and Spirit Center’s Lent 4.5 program offers many tips for eating as a moral act. This week, try one or more of the following:

• Abstain from meat.
• Buy food grown locally or regionally. Shop at a farmer’s market. Click here to find a farmer’s market near you.
• Avoid fast food or highly processed food.
• Consider growing some of your own food this year. If you’re new to gardening, consider taking a free class at Logan Trading Co. 
• Comment on this blog post. Let us know what food choices you make to care for creation.

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Community Garden Plants Vegetables and Blesses Ground with Service

On April 30th, under beautiful sunny skies, the volunteers of the Community Garden gathered together to plant the summer vegetables in the two beds in front of LaVerna center on the St. Francis of Assisi campus.  Already they have harvested several times the spring crops and donated to Interfaith Food Shuttle and Our Lady of Rosary Outreach.  With tomatoes, basil, squash, beans, and many other crops, this looks to be a very productive garden. 

One of our local Girl Scouts troops led by parishioner Lisa Curran continues to be of service to this project in planting herbs and flowers around the land and painting ceramic garden plates that identify the plants.  

Later that morning, Fr. Mark Reamer, OFM led a prayer service and ground blessing of the community garden.  During the service, everyone participated in a reading from Genesis of the creation story and in a ritual soil sprinkling with prayers of fertility for the garden.  The morning ended with a celebratory potluck.  

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A Relationship with “Dirt”!?

On Thursday evening, as part of a Franciscan Coalition conversation on our relationship with the environment, nearly seventy people gathered in Founders Room and viewed the film Dirt! The Movie, a documentary film that looks at the relationship between humans and dirt.  Using personal accounts, vignettes, animation, and storytelling, and inspired by William Bryant Logan’s acclaimed book Dirt: The Ecstatic Skin of Earth, this film shows how for most of the last ten thousand years we humans understood our intimate bond with dirt and the rest of nature. The film highlights well how many ancient people, including our Jewish and Christian brothers and sisters, through religious myth, ritual, and every day practices, saw soil as the sacred skin of the earth, the most precious resource, God’s gift of fertility and life.  They understood their responsibility was to be in relationship with the soil.  It was an organism that they were called to care for because it took care of them. 

But, as the film narrates, over time, we lost that connection, and through greed, neglect, and abuse, especially through industrial agricultural, mining, and urban development, we are now destroying the skin of the earth and suffering the consequences – droughts, starvation, flood, wars, and climate change. 

The film ends with some hopeful stories: schools turning their asphalt playgrounds into edible gardens; prisons using horticultural programs to give inmates inner peace, job skills, and a connection to “mother earth”; Generation Xers turning to organic farming and seasonal farm-to-fork shopping; scientists researching the energy capability of microbial life in the soil; farmers in India regaining their ability to farm sustainability through combining indigenous methods, modern science, and seed saving techniques; and many organizations commitment to investing in the long-term health of our soil through practices like reforesting and reintroducing perennial prairies. 

The film features interviews from many prominent environmentalists and activists, scientists, and sustainable farmers, like Vandana Shiva, Wes Jackson, Peter Girguis, David Orr, Alice Waters, and Wangari Maathai. 

The film was followed by an engaging conversation where the attendees offered a word or two about what challenged them, what affirmed them, and what inspired them.  There were a number of non-parishioners in the audience, many of whom have direct experience with some of these more hopeful examples of people trying to live well on the earth.

Bonnie Angel, Coordinator of the Franciscan Coalition, discusses community gardening with parishinors from Immaculate Conception parish in Durham

 As the film made clear in its soil-centric narrative, there is much more to be done on behalf of the soil.  Perhaps not all of the world’s problems can be traced back to our treatment of soil, but this film makes it very difficult to completely ignore what’s under our feet anymore.  In that vein, it indeed will take a concerted effort by everyone to change their behavior, to stop ravaging the landscape in search of cheap fuel and other products, to insist that our food be safe and grown in accordance with natural principles, and to join in the work of reclaiming and restoring degraded soils. In short, we need to not only recognize and appreciate, but also embrace our relationship with the living skin of the earth known as dirt.

Larry facilitates discussion after the film

Thank you to St. Francis of Assisi parishioner Larry Petrovick for organizing this event on behalf of the Franciscan Care of Creation Ministry.  Larry works for the Wake Soil and Water Conservation District and has over thirty years experience in natural resources management including water quality and watershed evaluation, planning and best management practice installation.  Larry is also involved in SFA’s Community Garden project, our parish’s very immediate attempt to care for the fertility of the soil of our church campus.

See the Movie Trailer here.

Winner of door prize - Tom Gerig, professor of Statistics at NC State University

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Community Garden Breaks Ground

On Saturday, March 5^th, over twenty volunteers gathered to break ground on an effort to create a community garden on the campus of the Catholic Community of St. Francis of Assisi.  By the end of the day, two 4 x 20 raised beds stood ready for planting in the front yard of the La Verna House. 

Many volunteers offered their hands, their strong backs, and their equipment, including three garden tillers.  St. Francis parishioners Pat and Paul Kelly are leading this initiative to bring a community garden to St. Francis’ campus through a Poverello Fund grant they received last year.  They continue to be guiding lights in this great project. 

SFA parishioner Eric Stanford, particularly, made a very generous gift of his time, labor, and lumber with the raised bed frames.  What was once going to be made into cabinets, Eric turned the white cedar wood into beautiful frames for this garden.  He put them together on site on Saturday with help from Girl Scouts Laura Sheridan and Zarya Curran. 

Laura recently received her Harvest Badge for her attention to eating responsibly and food justice issues.  As she helped Eric put together the raised beds and future trellising, she was able to make deeper connections about what it takes to eat from the bounty of the earth.  Zarya hopes eventually to be able to plant some flowers to bring in beneficial garden insects to the garden. 

Instrumental to the day’s overall flow was Deb Nelson who has been offering lectures and workshops at Logan’s Nursery for the last ten years.  She works full-time as principal librarian for NC Symphony, but SFA parishioners Pat and Paul Kelly took a Gardening 102 workshop from Deb at Logan’s over the past couple months, Deb took an interest in our project.  She ended up spending several hours with us getting her hands dirty with shovel and rake, directing the placement of the beds, and offering suggestions on ratio of mixing soil and compost.  She noted, “I think your veggies will be mighty darn happy in these beds.”

Another very beautiful donation came from Nature’s Green Releaf out of Franklinton, NC who donated nearly 20 cubic yards of finished compost.  By adding organic soil conditioner, finished cow manure, and this compost, we are set to have the most fertile soil in north Raleigh.  The plans are set for April 30^th to plant the first set of transplants into the garden beds.  We also hope to celebrate the planting with a prayer service and picnic. 

Also, see this short YouTube video from the morning’s work.

In the spirit of St. Francis of Assisi and rooted in our parish’s mission, we believe that the earth and all life is sacred.   Through teaching and example, the Catholic Community of St. Francis continues to investigate ways to incorporate environmental stewardship into all aspects of parish life.  This community garden project is one of the important ways we are doing this.

The mission of the SFA community garden is:

1.   To provide a place for community members to grow fresh, organic vegetables and fruits and experience God’s creation first-hand;

2.  To provide education and appreciation for how food is grown and to encourage healthy eating habits in our community;

3.  To bring together people of our parish and local community;

4.  To provide fresh, organic produce to those in our community who are hungry.

For more information about the community garden, contact Paul and Paul Kelly at mpmkelly@hotmail.com

 

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Community Garden Committee Hosts Potluck and Presentation

Cullen Whitley, head volunteer gardener of Victory Garden gives presention on community gardening

A multi-generational group over twenty people attended the Community Garden potluck and meeting on February 2, 2011.   St. Francis parishioners Pat and Paul Kelly are leading this initiative to bring a community garden to St. Francis’ campus.  With their committee and their many volunteers, we are hoping to break ground this spring.  At the Potluck gathering on the 2nd, Cullen Whitley, a forester and horticulturist, offered a presentation on the creation of the Highland Methodist Church Victory Garden and gave us tips on how to proceed with our garden planning.  Maria Pimentel from EPA attended and would like to work with our group to create an educational model using the community garden as a centerpiece for environmental education concerning water conservation, sustainability, etc.  We are also looking to partner with NC State University and the College of Design in planning the long-term vision and design of our community garden.  Sun Butler, Farmer and Educator with the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle, also shared information about the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle, their teaching farm and community garden program along with gardening information at the Potluck.  If interested in volunteering and/or contributing to the success of this garden, please contact Pat and Paul Kelly at mpmkelly@hotmail.com

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