Sugar Creek 2023

 

     Where can you play soccer, discuss personalism, eat mac’n’cheese made with homemade feta, and hear a community themed Abba parody all in one place? The Sugar Creek Midwest Catholic Worker’s Sugar Creek gathering is the only place I can think of.

As usual, Friday saw folks trickling into the remote ‘middle of nowhere’ eastern Iowa retreat center and tents slowly started to fill the grounds. The folks from the emerging St. Louis Catholic Worker prepared a simple but delicious (if I do say so myself) dinner of lentils and salad before the first camp fire of the weekend was sparked and the first boxed wine of decanted.

The Chicago Catholic Workers of Emmaus and St. Francis Houses were shocked to learn that the Saturday morning breakfast they’d signed up to cook was scheduled for a blindingly early 7:30! But their unwavering dedication saw them up with sun; making coffee, slicing fruit, cooking oatmeal, and scrambling eggs.
 

Satiated by the meal, everyone was ready for the ‘official’ kick off to the festivities with a big go around of community updates. This year each person was also invited to mention in 2 sentences their first interaction with the Catholic Worker, but as you the reader may know 72% of Catholic Workers are incapable of following such suggested constraints when discussing matters of the CW. The usual slate of CWs were there from Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan but folks also came from as far away as LA and Tampa! (Probably more but don’t get mad at me if I forgot your community)

With a break for Columbia, MO’s cornucopian burrito bar for lunch, the rest of the morning and early afternoon were filled with round table discussion. Family life in the CW, raising meat as climate health, war tax resistance, contemplative prayer, the CWs of Europe, stop cop city, fundraising, an update on the Uganda CW, woman priests, a song circle, and more were all on offer (but as an anarchistic movement plenty of other folks opted for a nap or some frisbee throwing instead.)

Soccer was then back on the schedule this year as the people wearing purple shirts and non purple shirts finished in a rousing draw in the end.

The Wisconsin farm folks of St. Isidore and Anathoth shared of their delicious abundance for dinner. There was both pork and beef from  home grown animals as well as the aforementioned macaroni dressed with dairy from Flora the cow and tomatoes of the like us city CWs have never seen or tasted. While dinner was happening discussion continued; young people in the CW, update on Jessica Reznicek, final community preparations for the evening talent show.

This year’s Saturday night entertainment was hosted by last year’s champion Jesse from the Detroit CW and featured an intermission of contra dancing! While folks enjoyed Brenna’s Martin Sheen stories, Lincoln reciting of Easy Essays, and Steve’s folks songs, in the end it was the crew from Bloomington, Indiana who took home the coveted Football Mary trophy. Their reworking of Dancing Queen to fit around the themes of community and the Bloomington CW’s 15th anniversary was a smash hit and calls for an encore were gladly indulged. “you will laugh, you will cry, having the time of your life…”

Another late night around the campfire was followed by an impromptu Winona, MN cooked french toast breakfast and Sunday’s customary closing liturgy. Songs were sung and prayers were prayed and folks reflected on the words of Peter Maurin and of the Gospel thanks to Maria who was volun-told she’d be leading us once again this year.

After a bit of cleanup, folks trickled out in a flurry of hugs just as they had come in. Even after sac lunches were packed for the road, the weekend’s leftovers were substantial and demonstrated in one final example of the renewed spirit of abundance and generosity we hoped to take with us back to our houses.


A few pictures on Google photos