Today, while watching a barn raising during an episode of Living with the Amish, the British Channel 4 series I’ve blogged about earlier which arranged for six British teenagers to live among the Amish and Mennonites for a summer, (watch it here on: http://www.channel4.com/programmes/living-with-the-amish, I was moved by the simplicity of the message and struck by how many our current problems could be sorted out by some modern form of barn raising. And apparently, according to the reaction of thousands of British viewers, I am not alone. 

In this episode, the three British boys join 40 male members of the community to do all the carpentry, while the three girls joined dozens of women in cooking a vast lunch for the 80 neighbors. Within five hours the main body of the barn had been raised, and by sundown, the last nail was put in place. But even more astonishing to the teens was the simple reminder, as the Amish narrator Jonathan puts it, of ‘what can be achieved if we all stand together.’

On Thanksgiving evening, while pondering all the things I could be grateful for, I and our family watched the first part of a series called ‘Living with the Amish.’

Britain’s Channel 4 had selected six typical British teens to fly over to the US and live among the Ohio Amish for six weeks last summer. The kids were a sociological pick-‘n’-mix: posh Etonian George, spoiled and pampered party-girl Charlotte, trendy Jordan, who was looking forward to spending time among the ‘minimalist’ Amish, sassy Siana, who has three fashion blogs, and James, who’d lived in foster care and hostels ever since his mother had been put away for arson.