Agape Community

The Agape Community, founded in 1982, is a lay Catholic, nonviolent community, ecumenical and interfaith in its embrace, with a ministry in peace education and nonviolence. Located on 32 acres of land in the breathtaking beauty of the watershed area of the Quabbin Reservoir on Greenwich Rd. in West Hardwick, Agape is under threat by development and lack of oversight by DEP (Department of Environmental Protection–Boston Globe, 6/25/04, "State Ready to Loosen Wetlands Regulations.")

For the past year, land around Agape has been sold to real estate developers who sometimes come from outside the town, clear cut trees without reverence for the character of the land and the animal habitat, build houses only to sell them for maximum profit, and then leave. This is a desecration and devaluing of the integrity of the land and presence of God speaking through nature.

Two houses have been hastily constructed by outside developers, seemingly overnight, approximately fifty feet from Greenwich Road and directly across from the entrance to Agape. Others are planned for various stretches of previously undeveloped roads in the West Hardwick area.
Agape’s Dilemma–Local and Global

People who come to Agape seek the solace of the quiet and beauty of the deep woods– contact with and consolation of Nature–the presence of the Divine. This reassuring stillness (no radios, no television, or, in the past–loud traffic noises), together with the unencumbered views of the natural world offer healing, rest and an experience of God’s gifts.

Smith College student, Tanti Lo (Agape College Retreat, ‘03): "The silence had a poignant effect on my thoughts and my feelings from a whole new perspective. I gave myself time be alone and contemplate, teaching me the beauty of simple things, how very little we need to be content."

A sanctuary for families in need, children at risk, people in crisis or in recovery, the community offers workshops, classes and retreats on simple living and alternative lifestyle. Agape’s wooded acreage, its alternative buildings and energy, integrate "green" ecology with the theology and practice of gospel-based nonviolence. Inner-city youth from St. Mary of the Angels in Roxbury and Latino youth groups from Lawrence, tell us that visiting Agape and the Quabbin are often their first experiences of total silence, without cell phone, headphones and traffic sounds.

The Agape Mission Council Endorses Purchase of Two Acres of Land

Agape’s governing board, consisting of fifteen people, lay and religious, among them college professors, an architect, a member of the Sisters of the Earth, a local poet, social workers, peace activists and war veterans, are dedicated to guiding the direction and vision of the community, whose main residence, Francis House is a "not for profit". The board determined that the present development will severely alter or eliminate the contemplative silence, which is the nonviolent heart of Agape’s mission, purpose and witness for 22 years.

We must purchase 2 acres of land for $45,000 by July 15th which could otherwise be bought by developers. We have raised $20,000. We are looking for outright gifts and interest-free loans. We have very little time left. Will you help?

Questions people have asked about Agape’s fundraising for land

Q: Don’t other people have right to build and live where you do?

A: Neighborliness and community are the essence of Agape as well as reverence for silence and respect for our natural surroundings. We are opposed to developers clear cutting watershed land for profit, without regard to the integrity of our living, breathing earth and its inhabitants.

Q: Why do you need more privacy? Isn’t your already existing 32 acres enough?

A: Francis House exists for the common good, accepting and welcoming all who come to an alternate, simple lifestyle rooted in Scripture and honoring the world’s religious traditions. Without a buffer from development, noise and unencumbered view, its contemplative charism will suffer as will its gift to others of a haven for retreat, silence, sustainable living.

Q. Isn’t sprawl inevitable? Why not just face reality. Why not give the money to the poor?

We believe that part of our mission is to protect the natural world from the onslaught of sprawl, the development and desecration of the natural habitat. The money spent is of benefit to the poor who come to Agape for respite, sustenance, peace and other assistance.

Your ongoing pledges and suggestions for further funding are deeply appreciated.

Please contact us at: Agape Community 2062 Greenwich Rd. Ware, MA. 01082 413-967-9369 peace@agapecommunity.org

Mission Council Members: Richard Bachtold; Rachelle Comptois; David Gill SJ; Robert Lueders; El Maclellan RSCJ; Paul Marosy; Paul McNeil; Alden and Janet Poole; Skip Schiel; Cornelia Sullivan; Robert Wegener; Teresa Wheeler; Suzanne and Brayton Shanley (All live in the Worcester, Boston area. Rich Bachtold, Suzanne and Brayton Shanley; Hardwick.)

The land mentioned above was purchased in July with an $18, 000 loan. We are attempting to retire this loan as soon as possible.

CAN YOU HELP? AGAPE IS A 501 3C. YOUR DONATION IS TAX DEDUCTIBLE

?When Heaven wants to rescue someone, it surrounds him/her with a wall of gentleness.?

-Tao te Ching

A time of great darkness has come our community of Hardwick, MA, to our family and our community, called Agape, a lay Catholic education ministry on Peace, located on Greenwich Rd. I felt the visceral reality of this desolation it in the pit of my stomach, when, for the first time I realized what we were dealing with on a personal, community, and even global level?sprawl?buildings going up, literally, all around us and seemingly overnight. Noise assaults us from all sides, sounds of incessant banging, huge, dinosaur-like machines digging, digging, howling their dominance and destruction of trees and forest all around us in the Quabbin Watershed area near Gates 43 and 44.

The concrete mixers, large machines and trucks in Hardwick, whether connected to the expanded dump or unchecked development, are ubiquitous, everywhere. The air, once sweet with bird song and early spring peepers, is assaulted daily by the alarming drone of the ?Beep, Beep, Beep? of perpetual intrusion. ?We are here,? say the machines. ?Development, developers?We are here. Notice us.? WE ARE BIG. WE ARE LOUD. WE EXCAVATE. WE RUIN. WE END TREE LIFE, DISPLACE BIRDS, ALTER THE NATURAL HABITAT OF WILD LIFE. WE ARE HERE. DON’T GET IN THE WAY.

This is honestly how it feels and the feeling is in stark contrast to our arrival as a family to Greenwich Rd, when we were drawn, quite enchantingly, mystically, to the pristine Agape woods near Gate 44 of the Quabbin Reservoir. Personally, I experienced in Hardwick, what, in the Celtic tradition is called: ?White Martyrdom," a strong desire to be located in a particular geographical place, prompted by the spirit and aura of its character. My "White Martyrdom" is the Quabbin Watershed, where 17 years ago, with the help of hundreds of beloved friends, we built a community house with careful architectural and environmental planning, naming it Francis House, after the Patron Saint of Ecology. Now, within a few short months, the area near Greenwich, Muddy Brook, Gaudet Roads has been developed with stunning swiftness with confirmation of more and more units daily. Everyone I speak to in town, whether in agreement or opposed to such development, is aware of a central fact: Hardwick is changing, houses are going up everywhere, land is being divided sold and developed at a dizzying speed.

Powerlessness, sheer, raw powerlessness in the face of greed, acquisitiveness is what I feel. Realtors, developers and even residents of my beloved town of rolling hills, stone walls, stunning hillside vistas, quaint General Store and pristine churches with white, steeples of dignity and grace, seem to delight in Hardwick’s growth, the prospects for increased personal income and more money for the town, represented, in part, by the Casella dump. The Casella situation the hazards of which, compelled many of us to join the SLOW group of residents trying to simply slow down the dump, is emblematic of how the acronym applies to all of the careless defacement of our tranquil landscape. Let’s slow it down. Let’s reflect on what is happening before the spirit of the town is diminished to the point of being unrecognizable.

Similar stories abound everywhere from all corners of Hardwick as residents share their tales of sprawl. How could this have happened we ask each other dazed and angry? How could two houses seemingly a few feet apart go up so boldly, harshly, glaringly, across from our home? Why are they so close to the road that they seem to be asking to be leveled by one of the twenty-two wheelers, carrying unknown quantities of trash from unknown places, to the state?s 6th largest dump?over an aquifer, in a watershed area two miles down the road?

The profit motive seems to rule over all other considerations, like the preservation of beauty, protection of a watershed area approaching two major gates of the Quabbin. Local friends and neighbors who oppose this assault on the earth and our sensibilities are not anti-people, or anti-neighbors. But we are pro-rural, pro-nature, pro-animal life, sensitive to the way eye and heart merge in creating beauty.

Do we allow developers and landfill corporations to have the last word? Or, are we still awake enough to change direction, to nurture a rural life, with inevitable growth, in a manner befitting the Town of Hardwick?s farming history and cherished smallness? Who will decide? Is it too late? Does anybody really care?

Can we do what the sacred Chinese philosophy of the Tao de Ching urges and surround our town and its people with ?a wall of gentleness and creativity?? We have before us an ancient choice between the life of the soul and the sell-out to greed and disrespect for the earth. Can those of us who oppose the wanton degradation of our sacred living space through noise, unchecked growth and a blighted land, summons the courage, good will and fortitude, to surround the developers with a Wall of Gentleness, a wall of resistance to this blind rush to thoughtless growth?

Can we add to the gracious stone walls of Hardwick, so lovingly preserved, an added wall of praise and honor to the earth, reverence for its beauty? Will we make the connections between violence to the earth in the local scene and the global realities of environmental degradation? Can we build a wall of gentleness and creativity around Hardwick and make our statement about the our love of the planet right here in our little town? Our town is "little" but the stakes are not. The stakes for the planet and the future are higher than most of us can begin to realize.