Jeffrey Bilbro is an Associate Professor of English at Grove City College. He grew up in the mountainous state of Washington and earned his B.A. in Writing and Literature from George Fox University in Oregon and his Ph.D. in English from Baylor University. His books include Words for Conviviality: Media Technologies and Practices of Hope, Reading the Times: A Literary and Theological Inquiry into the News, Loving God’s Wildness: The Christian Roots of Ecological Ethics in American Literature, Wendell Berry and Higher Education: Cultivating Virtues of Place (written with Jack Baker), and Virtues of Renewal: Wendell Berry’s Sustainable Forms.
Jeffrey Bilbro
Articles by Jeffrey Bilbro
Aristopopulism, Partisan Divides, and John Ruskin
Make plans to join FPR in Louisville on September 14th for our fall conference: Paying Tribute to Wendell Berry. "The Integralist Mirroring of Liberal Ideals." Timothy Troutner offers a critique…
Seeds, Workism, and Stoner
“Seeding Control to Big Ag.” Gracy Olmstead marvels at the wonders of seeds and explains the complex history by which a few large companies have come to dominate their distribution…
The Invisible Hand, Context, and Farm Robots
“Liberalism and the Invisible Hand.” Adrian Vermeule’s essay in American Affairs is worth printing and reading with care. He argues that “the key hallmarks or notes of liberalism’s invisible hand systems are…
Fierce Velleity: Poetry as Antidote to Acedia
In “Lying,” the late Richard Wilbur diagnoses one of our age’s endemic ills with the paradoxical phrase “fierce velleity.” For those of us who don’t use “velleity” every day, the…
Green New Deal, Tech Utopia, and Faith
“Growing a Green New Deal: Agriculture’s Role in Economic Justice and Ecological Sustainability.” Fred Iutzi and Robert Jensen consider the promise and peril of the Green New Deal and warn…
Robots, Andrew Jackson, and Spiritual Journeys
“Best of Bacevich.” Mark G. Brennan reviews Andrew Bacevich’s new collection of essays and finds his assessment of American foreign policy to be, as one would expect, pugnacious and provocative.…
Conservative Treehuggers, Manufacturing, and Monks
“Farms, More Productive Than Ever, Are Poisoning Drinking Water in Rural America.” Jesse Newman and Patrick McGroarty find that fertilizer and concentrated manure are polluting many rural wells. (Recommended by…
Useless Reading, Bothies, and Davos
“Fables of School Reform.” The lead of Audrey Watters’s essay says it all: “Over the past five years, more than $13 billion in venture capital has been sunk into education…
Originalism, Local Fiction, and the March for Life
“Remembering Fr. Richard John Neuhaus.” Ten years after Neuhaus’s death, Wilfred McClay reconsiders his life and work. This is a rich, thoughtful profile that brings Neuhaus’s ideas to bear on…
Spirits of Place
John Gatta is the William B. Kenan Jr. Professor of English at Sewanee: The University of the South. He’s the author of several excellent books, including Making Nature Sacred: Literature, Religion,…
Free Markets, Transhumanism, and Populism
"On the Experience of Entering a Bookstore in Your Forties (vs. Your Twenties).” Steve Edwards explores the ecology of reading, pondering the way that books, life, and place are hitched together.…
Dairy Farming, Monks, and Kirk
“For Love of Place: Reflections of an Agrarian Sage.” Allen White interviews Wendell Berry: “I don’t know how to bring about a major transformation of a huge economy, one that…
Craft, Rural America, and Beauty
The Porch will likely be quiet this coming week as we celebrate the Christmas season. Enjoy these next few days on a real porch (or, more likely, in front of…
Amish, the Farm Bill, and Universities
“Conscience and Resistance.” Earlier this year, Scott Russell Sanders described the profound effect that Thomas Merton had on his life: “Beginning with ‘Rain and the Rhinoceros,’ his work has helped…
Whose Nostalgia? Which Liberalism? Reflections on “Faith and Democracy in America”
Liberalism can be marked by the gospel and still be a political and cultural dead end. As Ivan Illich argued, corruptio optimi pessima.
Thomas Merton’s Contemplative Politics
Fifty years ago today, Thomas Merton died suddenly during a visit to Thailand. During the past few months, I’ve been thinking about the ways his life and writings speak both…
Port William, Front Porches, and Mobility
“A Clearing.” The Hudson Review published a new short story by Wendell Berry, narrated by Andy Catlett. “On the Front Porch, Black Life in Full View.” Audra D. S. Burch…
Sabbath, Membership, and Monopolies
“A Grave Climate Warning, Buried on Black Friday.” In the “news that isn’t news” category, Robinson Meyer summarizes the National Climate Assessment. It’s not a cheery picture. “Tallgrass.” Robin Wall…
René Girard, DNA Testing, and Turkeys
"The Evolution of René Girard.” In this excerpt from her new intellectual biography of Girard, Cynthia L. Haven synthesizes the key aspects of his one great insight. “Deneen Among the…
Amazon, Cities, and Farming Colleges
“Inhuman Communication: Søren Kierkegaard Versus the Internet.” Patrick Stokes draws on the Danish philosopher to gain insight into our digital media ecosystem: “According to Kierkegaard, … the media ― his…
Wildness, Attention, and Making Something
“Wild and Domestic.” Wendell Berry writes in Orion Magazine about this odd binary: "With only a little self-knowledge and a little sitting still and looking, the conventional perspective of wild…
Recycling, Flyover Country, and Reclaiming the Household
“Percy and the Persistence of Alienation.” Emina Melonic reviews Brian Smith’s Walker Percy and the Politics of the Wayfarer, arguing that Percy’s definition of the human as wayfarer has much…
Dirt Thick with Known Dead
While wandering in a used bookstore this summer, I picked up Donald Hall’s String Too Short to be Saved. I enjoyed Hall’s stories about his grandparents’ farm (the book’s title…
Washington’s Cheapest Fundraising Reception
Next week, citizens around the country will have the opportunity to vote in the most expensive midterm elections in US history. This depressing waste of money has been going on…