Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.”
— John 21:15&17
The risen Christ does not ask Peter if he is clever, efficient, or successful. He asks only if he loves. The command to feed the sheep springs not from management, but from love.
2. Meditatio
Laudato Si’ Week 2026 unfolds this week from May 17 through May 24, marking eleven years since Pope Francis released that troublesome little encyclical which managed, in true Catholic fashion, to irritate almost everyone precisely because it asked everyone to repent.
I remember its arrival well. It became a source of division between me and many of my Catholic friends, especially my father-in-law. To suggest that ecology might be a spiritual issue sounded to some suspiciously political, while to others it sounded hopelessly naïve. Yet perhaps Christianity has always sounded naïve whenever it insists that souls and soil belong together.
This year’s theme is “From Hope to Action.” For a decade I have excelled at rhetorical hope. I have written, debated, worried, reflected, and posted. Meanwhile the grass kept growing.
There is something wonderfully humiliating about Our Lord’s command. He does not say, “Impress my sheep,” or “Win arguments for my sheep,” or even “Organize my sheep.” He says feed them. Sheep remain gloriously unimpressed by ideology. They require grass.
So this week I finally decided that perhaps the most Catholic response to Laudato Si’ is not another essay but a trailer full of lawn clippings.
My new parish-based initiative, Feed My Sheep, harvests rather than mows lawns so that the cuttings can be turned into silage feed for sheep and livestock. It is absurd enough to be almost certainly Christian. Modern suburbia spends enormous amounts of gasoline cutting down grass nobody eats, hauling it away, and then purchasing feed hauled in from somewhere else by diesel trucks. The whole thing resembles a machine carefully designed by very intelligent people who have forgotten cows exist.
Traditional gas-powered lawn equipment contributes significantly to pollution and greenhouse emissions. Across America millions of gallons of fuel are burned merely to keep grass aesthetically short. Meanwhile livestock feed production itself accounts for an enormous share of agricultural emissions. So my tiny project seeks, in its own muddy and unimpressive way, to unite two disconnected worlds: lawns and livestock, parish life and stewardship, prayer and practice.
Of course, it is a ridiculously small thing. But Christianity has always preferred loaves and fishes to grand abstractions.
The problem with capitalism is not too many capitalists, but too few. In much the same way, perhaps the problem with ecology is not too much love for nature, but too little love for particular places. The modern man wishes to save the planet while remaining incapable of noticing the grass beneath his own feet.
And so perhaps my task is simply this: to feed the sheep nearest to me with the grass nearest to me under the eyes of the God nearest to me.
Hope finally becomes action the moment one pushes a mower.
3. Oratio
Lord Jesus Christ, You did not ask Peter to conquer the world, but simply to feed the sheep entrusted to him.
Teach me to love faithfully in small ways. Save me from the vanity of endless commentary without the humility of concrete action.
Through the prayers of Saint Rita of Cascia, patroness of impossible causes and wounded homes, grant me perseverance when good works seem foolish, when old divisions linger, and when reconciliation grows slowly as grass.
Bless the work of my hands, the pastures, the clippings, the sheep, the dogs, and all the hidden labor that nourishes life.
May I never forget that every creature ultimately hungers for You.
The modern world often imagines holiness as escape from ordinary material things. Yet Christianity stubbornly remains a religion of feeding. God does not save us by sending us an idea but by feeding us with bread become flesh.
That is why ecology matters spiritually. Not because the earth is God, but because the earth is where God insists on meeting us. The sheep eat grass; the shepherd eats bread; the saint eats Christ.
Saint Rita understood that holiness is usually accomplished not through dramatic gestures but through patient endurance. She consecrated suffering itself by refusing bitterness. In much the same way, perhaps creation is healed not by heroic slogans but by millions of ordinary acts of stewardship performed with love.
A man loading lawn clippings into a trailer may look ridiculous to the world. Yet Christianity was founded by a man carrying wood up a hill.
And both, in their own way, are about feeding sheep.
5. Actio — In Light of Laudato Si’ and Synodality
It is hard for us to accept that the way natural ecosystems work is exemplary: plants synthesize nutrients which feed herbivores; these in turn become food for carnivores, which produce significant quantities of organic waste which give rise to new generations of plants.
Pope Francis invites members of families to grow in holiness. A spouse can “be holy by loving and caring for your husband or wife, as Christ does for the Church… Are you a parent or grandparent? Be holy by patiently teaching the little ones how to follow Jesus” (14).
Laudato Si’ teaches that ecological conversion begins locally and concretely. Synodality reminds me that care for creation is not a private hobby but a communal vocation.
Action:
Today I will take one practical step toward making Feed My Sheep real: speaking with parishioners, organizing equipment, or gathering clippings that otherwise would become waste. I will remember that stewardship begins not with perfection, but with participation.
A darkly comic reminder that all appetites eventually become monstrous unless rightly ordered. The world constantly demands, “Feed me!” Christ alone teaches me what truly deserves to be fed.
A haunting meditation on hunger, control, and the wounds hidden beneath outward appearances. Every human being hungers for something; only divine love feeds without devouring.
8. Poetic Verse
The mower roared; the sheep still cried, While gasoline and grass both died. Then Christ spoke softly through the heat: “Love Me? Then feed the ones who eat.”
