The Church and the Land is a collection of essays and articles by England’s famous Dominican Distributist. De facto “chaplain” to the Distributists and the Distributist movement, Fr. McNabb was in many ways the most passionate and fervent of those seeking reform of economic life in the name of truly human values. In over 40 short essays, Fr. McNabb tackles subjects as diverse and yet unified as industrialism, morality and economics, working conditions, and the role of the state in shaping and defending the proper economic conditions. Fr. McNabb’s is a common and yet unique voice within the Distributist tradition, for he represents the voice of the Church, with its characteristic concern for morality and the salvation of souls, in economic as well as all other aspects of man’s daily life.
Reflections on Fr. Vincent McNabb, O.P. —Hilaire Belloc
Introduction —Dr. William Fahey
Preface —Fr. Vincent McNabb
A Call to Contemplatives
First Things First
Form A1
The Cry of the English
“The Voice of the Irish”
Why Satan Wins
St. Thomas Aquinas on Town Planning
A Tale of Two Cities
The Problem of Unemployment
A Challenge to Modern Industrial Methods
The Decay of Dancing
The Economics of a Riot
The Economics of the Exodus
The End of the Wage System
Do It Ourselves
The British Association and the Wage System
The Incubus of Industrialism
Looking Towards the East
The Modern Town and Birth Control
Nazareth Measures
Nature and Unemployment
The New Industrial Charter
A Grammar of Unemployment
Authority and Property
The Arrival of a Fact
Rights of the Parent
Agricultural Mass Production
A Window in Wisbech
Wisdom at Cardiff
The Widowed Land
Souls and the Land
The Social Need of Flying the Occasions of Sin
Is It Socialism?
The Joy of Poverty
The Land and Unemployment
Land-Work and Hand-Work
Industrialization of Land
What Wilt Thou Have Me Do?
The Two Kings
To the Child in the Manger
The Adventure of the Land
Some Thoughts on Reading Fr. McNabb-Dr. William Fahey
