THE LAND COMMUNITY

A generation ago, economist E. F. Schumacher described the mind-set and economic practice dominant in our time as “the forward stampede”; those committed to it are bent on ignoring the limits inherent in human existence, their watchwords being “more, further, quicker, richer.” In their view, the crises we face are to be handled, not by reconsidering the course of our technological “progress,” but rather by completing it. Schumacher contrasted the people of the forward stampede with those he called “home-comers.” The latter recognize that the beauty and dignity of human life depends upon living within certain limits that are necessary and therefore becoming. As Schumacher famously observed: “Man is small, and therefore small is beautiful. To go for giantism is to go for self-destruction.” In his view, the Christian gospel provides the basic text for the home-comer mentality: “How blessed are those who know that they are poor.…” Accordingly, insightful and prescient though he was, even Schumacher might be surprised at the ingenuity with which, a few decades later, the gospel has been appropriated by advocates of the forward stampede.