Growing in Faith

By Nordahl Flakstad
  Canada Lutheran April/May 2007 
 


 
 

Often it’s said there’s more to farming than making a living – it’s a way of life. Certainly that’s true for Ron and Sheila Hamilton, and their Sunworks Farm near Armena, Alberta, where they raise certified organic poultry and cattle. The farm is very much an expression of their faith, and their commitment to environmental stewardship and humane treatment of animals.

In barely a decade, with God’s blessing – assisted by daughters Shae and Erin and sons-in-law Adam (Belanger) and Matt (Paulson) – the Hamiltons have built a successful business while remaining faithfully rooted to their beliefs.

Neither Ron nor Sheila had farming backgrounds. In the early 1990s, living in Leduc, AB, south of Edmonton, with their preteen daughters, Sheila was a homemaker and Ron an oilfield surveyor who often spent weeks away from home. But the urban family hankered for more spacious and secure surroundings on an acreage.

In 1992, a friend alerted them to a vacated farm for sale just off Highway 21 between Edmonton and Camrose, Alberta. The land, rented out and continuously cropped for years contained several outbuildings and a long-abandoned farmhouse. Driving for the first time into the farmyard, sheltered by a growth of trees from the dust and noise of a nearby secondary road, Sheila thought: “I feel God has led us here. I had the feeling that while the place was not livable, we were home.”

The Hamiltons bought the half section and did make it livable by building a modern two-storey home. They were in the country but Ron was still often away. However, the family plunged into rural life and joined nearby Scandia Lutheran Church. That too was a new beginning of sorts. Sheila was raised as an Anglican (her father was a priest) and Ron was estranged from his Jehovah’s Witness roots.

In 1995, Daryl Skaret, a friend from the Scandia church, suggested Ron and Sheila attend a holistic management course in Camrose. It became what Sheila calls a “totally life-altering event.”

The Holistic Management Group of Alberta’s course focused on environmentally sustainable and socially responsible lifestyle approaches – including personal finances and work. When participants independently listed their personal priorities, Sheila and Ron were amazed how closely their lists matched. Their faith community and “bringing Ron home” were top priorities.

They decided the best way to ease Ron out of surveying was by transforming their hay producing hobby farm into a (eventually) paying organic-farming proposition. That fitted with new-found commitments to holistic management and with Sheila’s health priorities. She had been counselled to eliminate additives and synthetic chemicals from her diet to combat debilitating fibromyalgia, which had left her virtually housebound. It spawned a commitment, says Sheila, “to grow animals humanely and organically, and so that we ourselves could eat the meat.

“God gives us these animals to take care of and to consume. But the key words are ‘take care of’.”

(In the absence of such an Alberta program, Sunworks animals are certified through the British Columbia SPCA as humanely raised.)

Farming required an act of faith in the best of times and organic farming perhaps more so. “You have to have faith that God will carry you through,” Sheila insists.

The first year of organic farming hardly proved “commercial” with about 100 certified chickens raised mainly for consumption by family and friends.

Meanwhile, Ron delved into the learning and understanding of pasture poultry operations, which, rather than cooping up poultry within narrow confines, considers the birds foraging range animals. When supplemented with grain, chickens can derive a portion of their diet from grass and other wild vegetation.
     
Local organic farmer Don Ruzicka provided the Hamiltons with the first of numerous 120-square-foot portable shelters, which daily are dragged their own length across a field to supply forage for the chickens. The birds return the favour by enriching the soil with droppings. As good stewards, the Hamiltons remain committed to continually improving the fertility of their gumbo soil. In fact, despite manifold production increases, somewhat unusual, for contemporary farmers they had “too much land” and sold 160 “surplus” acres. By 2001, production had increased and Ron did come home to farm full-time.

With the support of their family, three devoted full-time employees and part-time help, Sunworks raises and sells 50,000 chickens a year (including throughout the winter, using comparable indoor feeding systems). Despite the increases in volume and year-round production, the Hamiltons remain as committed as ever to “giving their poultry a life.”

That means allowing the animals free movement in natural light without tricking them to feed and fatten faster through artificial lighting. (Sunworks Farm on average takes 63 days to raise a chicken compared with about 40 on non-organic farms). Humane treatment extends to alleviating stress and overcrowding during loading and transport to the processing plant.

Besides keeping about 1,000 laying hens and raising turkeys, the Hamiltons maintain about two dozen organically-fed Galloway and Highland cattle, which forage well into the winter, thereby reducing the need for grain fodder.

“We consider it our ministry to get good food to people,” says Sheila. It’s a ministry pursued beyond the farm gate and especially at the Sunworks stalls at Edmonton’s Strathcona Market and Calgary’s Farmer Market at Currie Barracks, where the Hamiltons are weekend fixtures. These are sites for selling products, including organic pork and lamb raised by Sheila’s sister Dorothy Marshall at Rosalind, Alberta, and beef from daughter Shae and husband Adam’s organic farm at Holden, Alberta. But the markets also become venues for the Hamiltons to connect with an ever-growing circle of loyal customers.

Almost invariably, customers evolve into friends, attracted by the message and appeal of “good food that nourishes the soul and the body.”

Talk of healthy food and humanely raised animals often widens into an exchange about care of the land and providing farmers – including organic producers faced by higher costs – a fair return for their efforts. That can lead to discussion about faith, and the Hamiltons happily share their beliefs about Christians’ roles as stewards of God’s creation.

As a day draws to a close at the market, some might measure success solely by sales. However, the Hamiltons prefer to gauge success by the number of lives they’ve touched and of relationships formed and fostered.

“If Sheila meets and really connects with five people a day and I do the same, in one day that’s 10 people. In a month it may be 50 and in five years perhaps 3,000 that we connected with. It’s even more if you count these people’s extended families,” says Ron.

Beyond the market, the Hamiltons willingly share their story of faith, farming and stewardship with church and other audiences. They’re also increasingly involved in wider issues of fair trade and in spreading the word about their approach to agriculture through their website: sunworksfarm.com and other forums.

With growing public consciousness about what we eat and how our food (including meat) is grown, the last decade proved a good time to embark on organic farming. Though their timing may seem fortunate, Ron is convinced “it’s not a matter of chance.”

“We’re not just here. We were given direction to do this. We’ve been blessed.” After a pause, Ron adds: “Some may understand what we mean by that – others may not.”