What this is

our plans for this substack

Hello! This is a group substack edited by Norann, Marianne, and Trudi. We are friends, and we’re also all members of the Bruderhof, a Christian intentional community with locations around the world. We’re hoping to use this space to write about things we’re interested in and to give you a window into what our daily lives in Christian community are like, and the variety of things that happen from season to season, whether celebration of church holidays, family events, and of course the turn of the actual seasons.

We live in different continents: Australia, United States (upstate New York), and Asia (South Korea), so we’ll bring perspectives from different cultures and also from the different places we are in our lives, whether raising families (Norann and Marianne) or living as a single (Trudi). We share a love of reading and history, and also all love children, the outdoors, and cooking.

The Bruderhof publishes a magazine Plough Quarterly, which includes serious journalism, theology, and commentary. This substack will be more casual, but we will at times reflect on things like how the vows we’ve made affect our daily lives – Bruderhof members make life vows of poverty, chastity (as singles or within lifelong marriage), and obedience. Since hospitality is such an important part of community we’ll also be sharing recipes and hosting ideas, as well as writing about the music and books we’re enjoying, either personally or with our families and communities. We’re open for questions on this or any other topic – please get in touch!

To introduce ourselves

Norann: A farmer’s daughter from New York and Pennsylvania, married to Chris & raising 3 sons in rural Australia. She teaches Year 11 and 12 English and Literature, and loves to write about discipleship, motherhood & feeding people. Norann’s writing has been published in Plough Quarterly, Christianity Today, and the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. She’s on Twitter as @NorannV.

Trudi: Although far from the familiarity of upstate New York, friends and family, and her work as a daycare and kindergarten teacher, twenty-five-year-old Trudi has found a home in Korea where she has lived for more than a year as part of a small, fledgling Bruderhof community. Slowly learning the meaning of discipleship and discovering new beauties of Korean culture, language, landscape, and cuisine, makes the journey worth writing about.

Marianne: lives at the Woodcrest community in upstate New York with her husband Kent and their five children ages 13 – 4. Outdoor activities, looking after the horses in the community barn, and reading are favorite occupations for their family. Marianne does administrative work supporting various Bruderhof ventures, and moonlights as an editor for Plough. She has edited two books. She’s on Twitter as @mair__wright.

What to expect

We’ll aim to post every 10 – 14 days, usually focused on a theme. Not all of us will write every time, and we’ll be inviting other Bruderhof members to write at times. We’re also planning to surface interesting and insightful writing from people who’ve been part of the Bruderhof over its 100-year history.

A winter recipe

We’ll sign off this first post with a seasonal (at least for the northern hemisphere) recipe. To make this you have to wait for that beautiful snowfall that drifts a couple feet deep, and then get out there while the snow is still fresh.

Snow candy

2 cups brown sugar
3 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup water

1. Combine all ingredients in a pot and boil until soft ball stage, plus a little more. If you have a candy thermometer, it should get up to 235° F.

2. Rush outside with the pot of candy, being extremely careful of any children in or around your house, and pour the candy on clean snow that’s a foot or more deep.

3. Everyone takes off their mittens and dives in.

4. This is a messy treat and you probably don’t want to do this more than once a year, but that one time it’s pretty great.

So that’s it until our next post, in which we’ll each tell about the community we live on: Danthonia in New South Wales, Australia; Woodcrest in New York’s Hudson Valley, and Yeongwol in South Korea.

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