A Crisis of Faith and Farming in Rural America
that one of the most difficult problems facing rural pastors and church leaders is an increasing sense of socio-economic despair that is gripping rural America. Many rural pastors say it is hard for people in urban settings to understand the deep connections farmers have to their land and to their farms. Many of the farms were passed down from generation to generation. Thus, farming is ingrained as a way of life and, in many senses, a divine calling. Andrea DeGroot-Nesdahl, bishop of South Dakota for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, whose family farm was settled by her grandfather, states: "We feed the world! That's what we've been told for years. It's hard to have that taken away." When failure is inevitable, the emotional scars are deep and sometimes never heal, others contend. It's not just a livelihood; it's an identity according to our author, Shannon Jung, chief author of Rural Ministry: The Shape of the Renewal to Come, and director of the Center for Theology and the Land, which is funded by the ELCA and the Presbyterian Church (USA). She asserts in large measure that when farmers fail, they feel as though they've failed themselves, their parents and their grandparents.
To compound the crisis even further, it is also apparent that many farmers in rural America feel betrayed not only by giant multinational corporations but by their government also. Many say the sweeping 1996 Freedom to Farm legislation, for example, which removed many agricultural subsidies, left farmers with no choice but to abandon the family farm. In retrospect, the research clearly demonstrated that farmers believe government bureaucrats and corporations have no vested interest in them. They stress the fact that many “outsiders” don't live in the community and could care less about anybody or anything outside of their profits. When the acquisitions, buyouts, or foreclosures occur, farmers exclaim they are forced off the land, and, consequently, get angry at God and withdraw from their churches and communities altogether. This feeling of isolation, both emotional and spiritual, has led to increased suicide rates, declining church attendance and domestic violence for families hit hard by the farm crisis. In light of the “crises” situations, farmers and the faith community contend, moreover, that even plans to funnel billions of government funds to America’s farmers has not created the dreamed panacea. The Clinton administration, they point out, announced in 1999 that due to the growing farm crisis, the U.S. Department of Agriculture would channel $1 billion of additional funds to the America's farmers. This came on the heels of $6 billion in emergency federal farm aid approved by Congress in October 1998. Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman at the time had even declared a national "pork crisis" in America to increase the price of hogs. The farmers, however, complained that 1998 was one of their worst years in recent memory. Farmers blamed the "crisis" on a confluence of problems: overproduction, high overhead costs, depressed demand due to the Asian crisis and [next page]