Founders
Laurie M. Johnson
Laurie Johnson is Professor of Political Science with a specialization in political philosophy. She is the author of seven books and numerous book chapters and articles. Most of her work has involved developing a thorough understanding and critique of classical liberal theory, and includes works on Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau and Tocqueville. Her most recent book, Ideological Possession and the Rise of the New Right: The Political Thought of Carl Jung, was published in 2019 by Routledge. She is currently working on a new book, The Gap in God’s Country, under contract with Wipf & Stock. She provides political philosophy and political theology content weekly on her Political Philosophy YouTube channel, currently with approximately 21,000 subscribers and 1.4 million views, and its associated podcast. She is an avid gardener and permaculturalist.
Jakob Hanschu
Jakob Hanschu is a researcher with a background in anthropology and critical theory. At Washington University in St. Louis, he studied the relationship between agrarian political economy, hydrological infrastructure, and nutrient pollution in the US Midwest. As a Fulbright Scholarship recipient at the University of Nottingham, he wrote a thesis on the critical politics of new materialism. He currently works as an applied anthropologist in Wisconsin, aiming to apply insights from social theory, ethnography, and philosophy to the practical and conceptual problems of agricultural health and safety.
Spencer Hess
Spencer Hess is a Catholic Worker in Kansas City, Missouri. He co-manages the John Paul II Catholic Worker Farm with his wife, Emily. They have roughly one acre of garden and orchard production as well as a small number of chickens, ducks, Nigerian dwarf goats, cats, and super-cute puppy. Spencer is a recent convert to Catholicism and is curious about questions as to how to authentically live out the social teachings of the Church in a way that doesn’t seem impossible. He’s spent the past 11 years either organic-farming or studying how to farm, but he’d be a far better farmer if he wasn’t so obsessed with abstruse questions vis-a-vis the Universal Destination of Goods and what post-liberal revolutionary praxis should look like. He currently co-manages the JPII Catholic Worker Farm, and is a Co-Founder and Secretary for The Maurin Academy.
Emily Hess
Emily Hess is a Catholic Worker in Kansas City, Missouri. She co-manages the John Paul II Catholic Worker Farm with her husband, Spencer Hess. They have roughly one acre of garden and orchard production as well as a small number of chickens, ducks, and most recently goats. Emily is a recent convert to Catholicism and is curious about questions of how to live out the social teachings of the Church in a way that doesn’t seem impossible. She’s worked on a small-scale organic farm in Lawrence, Kansas, as a production lead for an aquaponics lettuce system in Kansas City’s Historic Northeast, and spent a year interning at Cherith Brook Catholic Worker where she served the neighborhood poor and tended to their diverse homestead. Currently, Emily is working as a part-time production assistant with Oddly Correct, a coffee shop/roaster in Kansas City’s Ivanhoe neighborhood, managing the day-to-day life on the JPII Catholic Worker Farm, and is a Co-Founder and Communications Fellow for The Maurin Academy.
Colleagues
Christopher May
Christopher May is Catholic deacon living in Pennsylvania. He has placed his ministry under the patronage of St Lawrence, deacon and martyr, who cared for the poor in 3rd Century Rome. In his day job he is the lead chaplain in a large inpatient psychiatric hospital; he also serves his diocese and parishes in many other different capacities. His academic studies were concentrated in Philosophy, especially Phenomenology and Hermeneutics. His interests include: the spiritual care of persons, especially those with mental illness, the life of prayer, the philosophical shifts of the late medieval and early modern periods, Catholic social teaching, and home vegetable gardening & preserving. He is celibate, with two adult children. He is grateful for the opportunity to assist the Maurin Academy in Peter Maurin’s project of making a world where it would be “easier to be good”.
Ryan Dostal
Ryan Dostal works at Allen Centennial Garden, a free public garden on UW Madison’s campus. He uses his background in history, food systems, and education to share the process of growing food and flowers with his community. He studied history at Nebraska Wesleyan University as an undergraduate, completed a Master’s in Horticulture at Kansas State University, and spent several years working at historic house museums in Virginia where he managed historic gardens, supported research, and provided tours.