What Catholics can learn from the Free State Project

The Free State Project is something that's been on my radar for a while, I think I actually might've brought it up here more than once, but maybe I'm wrong.

You can read more about it here, but essentially it was a movement that started 20 years ago to generate interest in a mass migration of Libertarian-minded people to a predetermined location (which eventually turned out to be New Hampshire). The idea being that a migration on a large enough scale could influence the destination to their liking. Apparently it attracted Libertarians of all persuasions, across the spectrum.

By all appearances it eventually succeeded because in 2016 they reached their threshold and a bunch of Libertarians ended up moving to New Hampshire and it did indeed have an impact on shaping the political landscape of the state—because they elected a Republican governor in their 2016 biennial gubernatorial election. Chris Sununu is the first Republican governor of the state since 1997 with the exception of a two year stint from 2003-05 by Craig Benson.

Why do I bring this up? Well, this sort of mass-migration somewhere with likeminded people seemed more like a pipe dream that happened to work on a fluke for the Free Staters. They did it right, they chose the right spot to settle, and took their time to execute their plan.

I've sort of seen this on a smaller scale with faithful Catholics, like with Sam Guzman of The Catholic Gentleman relocated his young family from Wisconsin to rural Oklahoma near Clear Creek Abbey, where others were also beginning to settle.

But with the events of the past year, I seem to be hearing more chatter from Catholics about relocating. Circling the wagons, so to speak, in light of the political upheaval and the controversies within the Church (i.e. bishops capitulating with secular authorities and "experts" with nary a shred of resistance).

So it makes me wonder, might things be primed for such a migration effort to succeed where it might not have before? Timothy Gordon, author and podcaster, relocated his family from California to Mississippi last summer after he was unjustly (and possibly illegally) fired from his job at a Catholic high school in Bakersfield. Over the past few months he's been promoting a sponsor of his podcast called "Real Estate For Life", an organization which apparently is in the business of helping Catholics and Christians find communities of likeminded people to move near, and from the sound of things at least a portion of their commission goes to pro-life groups.

What do you think? Do you think that with the way things are taking shape in the world today, both in the Church and with secular powers, that Catholics would be more inclined to bite down on a proposed effort to move a large group of like-minded Catholics to a location that's more conducive to living out Catholic values? A place where we can marshal all of our resources to better resist the present, and coming, onslaught against the faith?

The idea being that beyond just circling the wagons, perhaps we could also influence state politics in such a manner that it provides a genuine example of a government that's framed by Catholic teaching—not just a liberal or conservative government that comes close to the mark on some issues (i.e. abortion, gay marriage) but misses it by a wide margin on others.

It seems to be like it could be possible. Granted out of the 80 million or so Catholics in America only a small fraction of them are faithful, but even of that fraction I would think we could find a reasonably sizable group willing to indulge this experiment.