A Scattering of Seed

Katie's Commons is a work in progress whose genesis can perhaps be traced to my coming to Gloria Dei Lutheran Church (GDLC) seven years ago.  The physical assets of Gloria Dei Church include a lovely building on the West side of Mulberry, Indiana.  The church structure, built in the mid 1970's, is a one story brown brick building situated on approximately 5 acres of land, part of which is leased to a local farmer and planted in corn or soybeans every year.  What is not building, parking lot or land planted in commodity crops is lawn with a small play ground, a picnic shelter, a storage shed and a few trees scattered about; all in all Gloria Dei enjoys a very pretty setting as a small town/rural church. However, these physical assets also set GDLC apart from the other Mulberry churches which are located on lots in town and necessarily have only small green spaces around them.  Land is a gift with which GDLC has been blessed; land is a blessing with which we can bless the community.

The idea of a community garden has swirled around in my mind for some time.  This summer at the Seed Savers Exchange Conference, in the midst of dedicated gardeners, seed savers and community activists, the idea began to form into a vision that can be realized. Here are a scattering of ideas, seeds, that have led to Katie's Commons to date:

The first idea for a name was the Neophuton Community Garden.  Neophuton is a Greek word and means "newly planted seeds."  It appears in St. Paul's writings and describes new Christians and churches, things which had never been seen before but which had great promise for new life, like a newly planted seed.  But a New Testament Greek name came to seem too geeky even to me and besides I couldn't get past hearing that word and seeing in my mind's eye the couch/bed (the new futon) we hauled (with much gnashing of teeth) to my daughter's college apartment a few years ago.

Katie's Commons felt right, a garden at a Lutheran church named in honor of Katharina Luther (nee Von Bora).  Katie was Martin Luther's wife and was quite instrumental in the Reformation.  In a time when women were often pushed to the background, Katie excreted an important influence not only in the Luther home but on all who passed through.  The recorded conversations around the Luthers' dinner table, called Table Talk, reveals her influence.  She is described in her biography as becoming, "gardener, fisher, brewer, fruit grower, cattle and horse breeder, cook, beekeeper, provisioner, nurse and vintner."  Indeed, these attributes point very nicely to a goal of Katie's Commons to promote and facilitate food security in our community.

Here I end for today.  There are more seeds to recall, but that must wait for another time