“Peace on Earth,” our patron saint, Pope John XXIII, begins his last and most famous encyclical letter to the Church and all people of goodwill, “which man throughout the ages has so longed for and sought after—can never be established, never guaranteed, except by the diligent observance of the divinely established order.”

Here at John XXIII Montessori Center, we know that God has created a sacred order that defines our existence.  In the words of our Manifesto, “We are rooted in nature, we are rooted in relationships, and we are rooted in the inexhaustible search for truth that drives us.”  While the late pope’s encyclical primarily dealt with international relations between states, we also know as Christians that the sacred order that determines proper relationships between persons also applies to how we humans, as embodied souls, relate to the rest of creation.  We are to be stewards of God’s good work, generously elevating and exercising our dominion over it through the use of reason.  

Further, it is clear that God has blessed our community abundantly with the gift of good land.  Our scenic property offers unique opportunities for our children and their families to investigate God’s goodness and beauty.  In an attempt to honor this gift, more fully realize its potential, and provide the “prepared environment” in which our students can encounter reality, we are beginning this fall the creation of a wonderful experiment.  

We are calling this new project, “Pacem in Terris,” after our namesake and his legacy.  In short, what we are doing is creating a garden in the majority of the White Oak’s students' former chicken run, behind the blue stable, and plan to sell the produce through a CSA mode of distribution.  The acronym stands for “community supported agriculture” and it describes a farming business model where the year’s harvest is purchased in “shares” ahead of time by customers who will receive regular portions of the crops as they come in over the course of the growing season.  We will also likely offer periodic market days that will be advertised and allow other customers to purchase vegetables if we have more than is allotted to each shareholder. 

The CSA’s goal is to be an educational and social resource to the Center community.  The garden will be an extension of the classroom for all ages and will have particular relevance to the White Oaks adolescent program as they build practical life skills and participate in society's fundamental mechanisms of “production and exchange.”  While students will have frequent access to the garden’s goods, we also hope the produce and work itself will be of benefit to whole families as they get involved.  

Simultaneously, as we launch this new blog and blog post on the Center’s website, we also are extending the first invitation to you, dear reader, to sign up for a share in our CSA program.  In 2025, we are looking to sell 11 shares at $520 each.  Shareholders will receive a weekly grocery package from the first week in May till the last week in October, which amounts to $20 a week for 26 weeks.  Each grocery package will contain 4-5 items of the weekly harvest that would resemble several $4-5 purchases of produce from your local supermarket.  Ideally, customers would pay for the share before the growing season begins, but we are open to payments on a weekly basis if that works better for your family.  Shares could also be split between several families.  And, again, we will plan to have periodic market days advertised through the Center’s literature that are open to the public if an abundance of produce is harvested in a specific week.  

Peace on earth, pacem in terris—there may be no better image for the kingdom of heaven than this.  The prophet Isaiah records a vision for the world to come, saying, “The wolf shall live with the lamb; the leopard shall lie down with the kid; the calf and the lion will feed together, and a little child shall lead them” (11:6).  As Dr. Montessori so often emphasized, it is the child who will lead us to peace; the substance of which is “the knowledge of the Lord,” as the prophet concludes (Ibid.).  Our prayer is that through this new adventure, all who participate in tending our soil and reaping its harvest will come to know reality ever more fully, the good ordering of creation, and that peaceable kingdom for which we all are longing.