Householding on Christopher Carter

The Return to Normal

Sun, 25 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

I don’t advocate for recovering a family-centered economy because I want to “be Amish”. I’m not skeptical of continually increasing reliance on oil and electricity because I’m a “doomer”. I don’t think you should delete all your social media accounts and own a dumbphone because I’m “anti-technology”. My skepticism of the core elements of modern life does not make me “anti-progress”. My wife and I don’t abstain from birth control use because we’re “irresponsible”.

Make Your Home

Sun, 16 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Young men, fill your home with as much joy, beauty, and meaning as you can. Teach your family to sing, worship, laugh, read, work, and do every other good and natural thing. Make your home a safe haven, a little world unto itself; a beacon of hope and joy in the gloom of this vast dystopia.

A Quick and Practical Guide to Radio

Mon, 10 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The best option for family communication during travel, adventures, and emergencies, is old fashioned radio.

Reject a "Career", Embrace Independence

Mon, 12 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Modernity is a series of abstractions from the real world.

The things we depend upon for daily sustinence are merely the presentation layer of a complex network of supply chains, technologies, contracts, laws, and financial instruments. As moderns, don’t get our food from the ground, where it comes from, but from the grocery store, where it is pre-processed, packaged, and sold. We communicate virtually via computer networks more than we do face-to-face. We buy more things online from ecommerce giants like Amazon, and box stores like Home Depot, than we do from mom and pop brick and mortar stores. We are, as one of my friends put it, a “third person society”; our friendships are third person (podcasts), our politics are third person (whatever they’re doing on Washington), and even our sex is third person (pornography). We don’t even use our own money to buy things anymore; we take short term loans of other people’s money via an electronic network (a credit card) to pay for our own purchases.

Be Fruitful and Multiply: The Antidote to the Poison of the Service Economy

Mon, 10 Jan 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The Christian tradition has always placed a strong emphasis on property ownership. In fact, it is such a central concept to the law of God that it is one of the Ten Commandments: “do not steal”. The books of the law, like with the other commandments, give various case law examples of how to “not steal” in day-to-day life and business. “Stealing” need not be limited only to the forceful or discrete acquisition of something which is not yours. Various laws against stealing prohibited improper or unjust valuations, as well as inaccurate weights and measures (Leviticus 19:35-36), usurous and consumptive interest on debts (Exodus 22:25), negligent destruction of property (Exodus 21:35-36, 22:6), breaches of trust (Exodus 22:7), and so on. Laws against theft were to be punished by restoration of whatever was stolen, plus an extra amount (usually 20-25%) to account for the damage done by the deed. Under God’s Law, whoever owns a piece of property really owns it; it is truly his, and only he has a right to its use. Disputes about property ownership were made before God between private parties, mediated by the Levitical priesthood as a representative of God’s law. God is the proprietor of all things, and hence is the only appropriate mediator to any dispute regarding property rights.