The Peaceable Kingdom is an ancient theological idea that dreams of the world coming together after discord and disconnection. This idea – it is present in St. Augustine’s “City On The Hill” as well – was always on my mind when I moved to upstate New York and bought a farm. I had this idea, this fantasy, I think, that I could forge such a kingdom, bring it bear with thought, care, and affection. I always saw the animals on my farm as a peaceable kingdom, sentient beings who, if cared for well, would live together in harmony and contentment. This is part of our attraction to animals, the chance to do for them what was not done to us.

This dream of mine has been disrupted so many times. By my own disturbance and anger and fear. By death and illness. By foxes and sick and dying dogs. By angry people on the other end of technology. By recessions, divorces, economic upheavals, changes in the culture of the world. By Simon and Rocky, real estate markets, and by a world that seems to be heading in the opposite direction, to a kingdom of fear, warnings, conflict and denial.

I think farms are so appealing to people because they give us the opportunity to create such a kingdom, a self-contained world of sustenance, nurture and perhaps healing as well, because so many of the people I know who have come to farms – people like me –  are in search of the healing that emanates from the Peaceable Kingdom, the City Of God. If the animals can live with one another, why can’t we? That has always been the core of this idea.

I think I have come to see in my spiritual yearnings that this kingdom is a vision, a city on a hill, a dream, we come to it step by step, bit by bit, day by day, it does not appear all at once like some spiritual empire constructed over night. This morning, I came out to the pasture and I got a glimpse of this world, this vision, my dream right before me. Donkeys, chickens, sheep and a barn cat all gathered under the shade of the apple tree in the pasture. It would have been so much more complete if Rocky were standing there too, but the Peaceable Kingdom, like life on a farm, is not a perfect world. It is a world of glorious moments, shafts of light, intimations of promise, hope and faith. But, clearly, part of why I am. And inspiring to see.