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Wendell Berry’s radical lesson for Christians: Live what you believe

September 3, 2026 · 1 min read

(RNS) — I was graced just once in my life by the presence of Wendell Berry, the farmer-poet who died earlier this week at age 92.

Over 20 years ago, I heard Berry speak at the annual conference of the largest professional association for my academic discipline. I was intrigued that someone known for his Christian faith would be invited to speak in a solo session by an organization not known for being terribly friendly to Christians.

If you’ve ever been to an academic conference, you know that attendance at individual sessions varies wildly. I know of panels with one attendee in the room who was not on the panel. A handful in a room is also fairly common. One never knows what to expect, especially at a convention as large as this, with hundreds of sessions over several days. Berry was assigned a good-sized room for his presentation, but as it turns out, the planners should have given him a bigger one. It was a standing-room-only crowd, and when he finished speaking, those who were sitting joined the rest for a standing ovation.

It had been ingrained in me since my early adulthood that Christians were despised and rejected by the world—especially within academia. I had…

Source: Religion News Service · Read the full story →

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Đorđe Simić

I read several of Berry's essays on land and community, and it really struck me how he lived what he wrote—he didn't just talk about small farms, he plowed and sowed himself. I'm just wondering what part of his speech at that conference got the audience so fired up that they all stood up. Thanks for sharing this memory.

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ქეთევან ჯავახიშვილი

I remember reading Berry's essay "The Unsettling of America" and immediately realized that the man not only writes, but lives what he says. I am also interested in what exactly he said at that conference that the full hall stood up. For me, this is the biggest lesson - that word and deed should go together.

Danica Radovanović

Yes, that's what touches me the most about Berry - that he didn't just sit and write, but actually plowed, sowed and tended his farm in Kentucky. I heard that at that conference he mostly talked about how faith must be lived in concrete things, not only in ideas, and that this surprised many. Have you read his book "The Unsettling of America"?