Chestnut Ridge

Creation Care & Sustainable Livestock Practices Retreat, July 25-27

Chestnut Ridge will host a fun and intensive weekend workshop to inaugurate the livestock portion of The Community Farm at Chestnut Ridge and you're invited!

Come and join The Community Farm at Chestnut Ridge for a special retreat and workshop. July 25 - 27, we'll introduce sustainable livestock practices as we install new fencing and housing for sheep, hogs and chickens at The Community Farm.

Retreat leaders include Fred Bahnson from Anathoth Garden and Rich Church from Winfield Farm as well as year-round staff at Chestnut Ridge. The weekend will include theological education and reflection as well as the introduction of sustainable and organic farming practices.

Weekend Topics

Livestock Practices Retreat

• A Theology of Manual Labor
• A Theology of Eating Animals
• Raising Chickens
• Chicken Tractors
• Backyard Broilers and Layers
• Fencing
• Building Corner Bracing for Fencing
• Installing Field Fencing
• Installing Electric Fencing
• Goats & Sheep
• Raising Meat Goats & Sheeps
• Goat and Sheep Breeds
• Goat Dairying and Cheese making
• Pasture Based Management
• Rotational Grazing
• Companion Species
• Pasture Grasses and Legumes
• Maintaining Pasture Fertility
• Hogs
• Raising Pigs on Pasture

Saturday Evening Celebration

We're delighted to welcome Fescue 911 back to Chestnut Ridge to perform some folk, bluegrass and maybe even square dancing. The music and fellowship are free and open to the public, so tell your friends!

Sunday Worship

Livestock Practices Retreat

Don C. Richter hails from Decatur,Alabama, and now resides in Decatur, Georgia. An ordained PC(USA) minister and educator, Don is associate director of the Valparaiso Project on the Education and Formation of People in Faith. He manages practicingourfaith.org, administers the Project’s grant program, and coordinates resources for youth and youth leaders, including Way to Live: Christian Practices for Teens, co-edited with Dorothy C. Bass (2002), and Mission Trips That Matter: Embodied Faith for the Sake of the World (2008). A graduate of Davidson College (A.B.) and Princeton Theological Seminary (M.Div., Ph.D.), Don has served as Associate Pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church in Louisville (KY); he was the founding director of the Youth Theology Institute at Emory University and he has taught Christian education at Emory's Candler School of Theology and Bethany Theological Seminary. Don’s son Jonathan is a junior at Guilford College (NC), and his daughter Katherine is a sixth grader. Don’s family worships at Central Presbyterian Church (Atlanta), where he sings tenor in the chancel choir.

Workshop Facilitators

Fred Bahnson

Fred started farming with his wife Elizabeth on a small cottage farm in Efland, NC. Five years and two children later, Fred has scaled back on the Efland farm, though his wife still milks their two goats and maintains a large flock of layers. Fred's farming energy for the past three years has gone to Anathoth Community Garden, a ministry of Cedar Grove UMC, which he helped found and where he now works as garden manager. Anathoth, which provides food to roughly 40 member families from April-November, is a diversified 2 acre mini-farm boasting a plethora of fruits, vegetables, and cut flowers. In addition to managing daily operations at Anathoth, Fred also speaks, teaches, and writes about the work there, encouraging other churches to start community gardens as a way to "seek the peace of the city." Fred's poems and essays have appeared in The Cresset, Orion, Pilgrimage, The Christian Century, and Best American Spiritual Writing 2007.

Rich Church

Rich is a lawyer, farmer, and writer living outside of Siler City, North Carolina.  With his wife, Kristy, and their children, they manage Winfield Farm, where they raise cattle, goats, sheep, hogs, and chickens on pasture as well as maintaining a 1/2 acre market garden.  Rich holds both a J.D. and Ph.D in theological ethics from Duke University and formerly served as an Assistant Professor of Religion at Wingate University.  His writings have appeared in the Journal of Law and Religion, the Notre Dame Law Review, and the Cresset.

Rhonda Parker

Rhonda is the Center Director at Chestnut Ridge where she is blessed to lead a vibrant ministry to and on behalf of the church. The Community Farm at Chestnut Ridge is the culminating effort of several years of curriculum and program development around the theme "Food, Faith and Farming" which unifies all the center's programs. When not in the garden or playing with campers and staff, Rhonda enjoys leading workshops, preaching in the local church, traveling, and spending time with her three children and husband. Chestnut Ridge's mission to make the love of Christ visible in our world embodies her understanding of discipleship and community. 

How to Register

Register online for the Livestock Practices Retreat (July 25-27)

Payment can be made by mail or phone.

The retreat is open to all interested persons. The format of the retreat will be focused on adults. If you have a teenage person that may be interested, please contact us to discuss.

Thanks to a generous grant from the Valparaiso Project, the cost of the weekend is only $40 per person, which includes 2 nights of lodging and 5 meals (all three meals Saturday and breakfast and lunch Sunday). Persons from partner churches (Efland, Union Grove, Chestnut Ridge and Cedar Grove UMCs) may register for $30 for the event. Plan to arrive at Chestnut Ridge between 6 and 7pm on Friday evening. We'll wrap up by 4:30 pm on Sunday.

These weekend events will have limited registration, so we encourage interested folks to register early. 

Need more information or prefer to register the old fashioned way? Contact Rhonda Parker at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or call the camp office.