More about Dirt Christianity

Peasant Times-Dispatch Issue 11

Hello Again!

Dear Readers,

The months seem to fly by don’t they? This month you’ve got a double dose of the Peasant Times-Dispatch—we had a podcast where we introduced

Hambone

and talked about Dirt Christianity. You can listen to the Podcast HERE and hear from the horses mouth our unfiltered ideas on this subject. Having had a chance to chew on this, this article will expand on those ideas.

As always, thank you for being here, please enjoy!

---

Farmers of Men

Earlier in the Peasant Times-Dispatches history, I wrote a short summary of some parables and offered my thoughts as to why Christ seemed to speak to the multitudes in parables. One of my favorites of these is the Parable of the Sower, in Matthew 13.

And he spoke to them many things in parables, saying:

Behold the sower went forth to sow. And whilst he soweth some fell by the way side, and the birds of the air came and ate them up.

And other some fell upon stony ground, where they had not much earth: and they sprung up immediately, because they had no deepness of earth. And when the sun was up they were scorched: and because they had not root, they withered away.

And others fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up and choked them.

And others fell upon good ground: and they brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.

He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

A common interpretation of this is in the context of evangelism: you have to identify who is receptive, who is not going to receive the good news very well.

For Dirt Christianity, the relevant idea here is that you are the dirt, I am the dirt. This rhymes a bit with the words we hear on Ash Wednesday—I am dust, and to dust I shall return.

This tells us that we need to make sure we’ve put in work to prepare ourselves. We need to make sure we’ve invested in our roots, we’ve removed the thorns in our lives that inhibit our spiritual flourishing.

But also, let’s not understate this: we are the dirt. What could be less important than dirt? What could be lower than dirt? Who are we to the history of salvation?

We can turn to Don Colacho¹ for proper context:

I do not yearn for a virgin nature, a nature without the peasant’s ennobling footprint and without the palace crowning the hill. But a nature safe from plebeian industrialism and irreverent manipulation.

Nature is ennobled by the labors of the peasant. The farmer does work and gives meaning to the soil. So too does the sower in our parable. We are dirt—but the sower’s ennobling footprint gives us meaning in our capacity as dirt².

So, Who Is The Sower?

The Sower is Christ. Christ has come to this virgin earth and ennobled it with His footprints and served as the culmination of salvation history and the beginning of a new covenant with his people—us, we Christians.

Notice—the sower is giving freely to everybody. No one is denied an opportunity to bear the seeds! The outcome of the seeds depends entirely on the preparation of the soil. So in a way, we can do work to prepare ourselves to be better soil.

What can we do to prepare ourselves? Well let’s look at what kind of things can harm us in the parable!

Birds are the first thing mentioned. Wherever the seed falls, there will be some birds lying in wait trying to snatch it up. This represents spiritual warfare. There are demons, there is evil in the world. Whenever you commit yourself to make an act of devotion and love to God, you will find that you struggle more than life becomes an easy walk in the park. There are a lot of legitimate reasons for this, but one reason that I often ignore is the deliberate effort by the evil one to hinder my progress. If we allow ourselves to be hindered, then the Birds have eaten up the good seeds and no progress is made. We have to fortify ourselves against evil with the basic tools at our disposal: Prayer, sacraments, scripture, devotion. We must be, in other words, ready to receive the seeds, so they don’t lie on the surface waiting for birds. We must be open and receptive, willing to hear the good news!

Shallow Roots are the second danger. Shallow roots are caused by stony ground—ground that has not been adequately prepared. When we are early in our formation, perhaps there are some obstacles we have to our COMPLETE faith and devotion, we are still figuring things out. When the Hot Sun comes and challenges us, our lack of depth will lead to our faith withering under the pressure. This is a very common phenomenon—how many of us, in times of difficulty or stress, have stopped praying when that’s exactly what will help us the most to make things easier? How many of us have faltered in our devotions because things have gotten mildly challenging? We need to be constantly clearing out obstacles to give room for our faith to become more and more rooted in us, the soil.

Thorns are the things that compete for our air. Christ uses the language that the seed becomes “choked” and I don’t think that is a coincidence. There are a lot of things that we want to give our attention to. Political news, the economy, palace intrigue, neighborhood gossip—but how many of those things help our ground to be more prepared? We must find a way to manage and keep the thorns at bay so we can give proper focus and attention to our soil and giving our faith room to grow and flourish.

What Is The Seed?

The seed is our faith. But not only faith. Christ is trying, always, to put the seeds of faith into our soil. We need help.

In Catholicism, the best illustration of this seed imagery is in the Eucharist. The Eucharist is Christ: Body, blood, soul, and divinity. Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. Every Sunday (and every day, if we can!) we have an opportunity to receive the Eucharist and receive the seeds of Faith into ourselves bodily and spiritually. Preparing our soil to receive the Eucharist with the sacraments—Reconciliation, Baptism, Confirmation—help us to tend our soil. Regular examination is a good way to make sure no stones are hidden in the soil, no thorns are threatening the growth of the seed of faith. In the Latin translations of the text, you find in the Our Father the words panem supersubstantialem which means supersubstantial bread. This bread is supersubstantial because it has transcended—gone beyond—the mere substance of bread, but become Christ himself!

If you are a non-Catholic Christian, there’s an alternative illustration of the seed imagery. The Word. In the Gospel according to John, it begins by saying that Christ is the Word, and the Word was made flesh. In scripture, the Word is made flesh is made word. We can take in Christ in this way as well—receive the Word—and give it room to grow. I don’t know much about the practice of various other denominations, but scripture is almost universally agreed upon to be important. Spend time with scripture to allow the word to enter, and put in the work to prepare yourself so the word can sink in and grow roots.

TL;DR

We are the dirt. Christ is both sower and seed—He is seed in the Eucharist, He is seed in the Word. Let both into your soil, and see how deep the roots can grow! Work hard to give the roots room, and to clear obstacles for stalks. And watch as you bear spiritual fruit thirty, sixty, and hundredfold!

---

Thank you for reading!

Did you know I recently hit a MAJOR MILESTONE of 200 Subscribers? We’ve actually ALREADY HIT 300! Check out the article here where I celebrate YOU! EXTENDED THRU JULY 31— You can get 20% off a paid annual subscription! THANK YOU so much for subscribing!

God bless you all!

Ad Jesum Per Mariam

1. Don Colacho’s Aphorisms #989

2. Don’t misunderstand me, on this point. Every human life is infinitely valuable to God! But what dirt can, of its own accord, sprout up good fruit? What can we do on our own?