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April - June 2010 vol. 23 no. 2
radicalgracea publication of the center for action and contemplation
Creation as the Body of God
3 creaTiON aS THe BOdY OF gOdBy Richard Rohr, ofm
4 TeilHard de cHardiN: acTiON, cONTeMPlaTiON, aNd THe cOSMOS
By John F. Haught
6 lOVe gOd, lOVe creaTiONBy Mary Jo Picha
8 aWaKeNiNg TO THe SacredBy Paula Gonzalez, sc
10 SOUl: YOUr Place iN NaTUreBy Bill Plotkin
12 creaTiON aS THe BOdY OF cHriSTBy Ilia Delio, osf
14 creaTiON, iNcarNaTiON, eUcHariST: THe ONe BOdY OF gOd
By Daniel O’Leary
16 reTrieViNg ST. FraNciS: radical WiTNeSS FOr aN ecOlOgical age
By Keith Douglass Warner, ofm
18 THe eTerNal rOSeBy Avideh Shashani
19 iN TaNdeM, THe MaN aNd THe TreeBy John Hartigan
20 THe alliaNce OF WOrld religiONS aNd ecOlOgY
By Mary Evelyn Tucker
iNSide rg
A collision of opposites forms the cross of Christ. One leads downward preferring the truth of the humble. The other moves leftward against the grain. But all are wrapped safely inside a hidden harmony: one world, God’s cosmos, a benevolent universe.
in “Creation as the Body of God” (page 3), Richard Rohr states that “the incarnation actually happened 14.5 billion years ago with a
moment that we now call “The Big Bang.” John Haught, in his article (page 4), expands on this idea: “Theologically speaking, the evolving universe is the extended and still developing body of Christ.”
These concepts are part of an historical ecological tradition carried through the centuries by some of the great mystics, including Francis, Bonaventure, Scotus and Aquinas.
I invite you to read this issue in the light of this tradition, and reflect upon your participation in creation, the body of Christ.
~Vanessa Guerin
For information on and to register for the CAC-sponsored summer 2010 conference, Creation as the Body of God with Fr. Richard Rohr and Sr. Ilia Delio, please visit www.cacradicalgrace.org.
ediTOr’S NOTe
editorVanessa Guerin
editorial TeamJanet Lear, Joni Thompson, Judy Traeger
ProofreaderShirin McArthur
design / layoutMonique Estrada
artworkCOVER and page 12, The Flammarion woodcut is an enigmatic wood
engraving by an unknown artist that first appeared in Camille Flammarion’s L’atmosphère: météorologie populaire (1888). The image depicts a man
peering through the Earth’s atmosphere as if it were a curtain to look at the inner workings of the universe, comprising the classical “Seven
Heavens” of diverse tradition and literature.
Page 5, Jesus, the Icon of And, detail from painting by Sr. Nancy, Earle, smic, 2008.
Page 6, Detail from Madonna Enthroned with the Child, St Francis and Four Angels, fresco by Cimabue, 1278-80.
Page 8, Rotating Triangles, sculpture by John Searles, © 2003, www.searlesart.com. Used with permission.
PhotographyPage 15, Creek, photographic detail, © Shirin McArthur.
Page 19, Great Spirit, photograph by Thomas Vorce, thomasvorce.zenfolio.com. Used with permission.
PoetryPage 7, “The Opening of Eyes” by David Whyte,
from Songs for Coming Home ©1984 Many Rivers Press.
Radical Grace, the quarterly publication of the Center for Action and Contemplation, is an ongoing means of relationship and communication with the CAC community. Friends making a suggested donation of $35.00, receive a year’s worth (4 hard copy issues, or the more sustainable online, downloadable, full color PDF version for $25.00) of Radical Grace. Australia and UK friends (only) please visit www.cacradicalgrace.org to subscribe to Radical Grace.
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MiSSiON STaTeMeNT: We are a center for experiential education, encouraging the transformation of human consciousness through contemplation, equipping people to be instruments of peaceful change in the world.
The center for action and contemplation
Integrating a contemplative lifestyle and compassionate action
THe cac SUPPOrTS a NeW reFOrMaTiON—from the inside:
• In the spirit of the Gospels• Confirming peoples’ deeper spiritual intuitions• Encouraging actions of justice rooted in prayer• With a new appreciation for, and cooperation with,
other denominations, religions, and cultures
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By Richard Rohr, ofm
creaTiON aS THe BOdY OF gOd
“Creation is the primary and most perfect revelation of the Divine.” ~ Thomas Aquinas
“God remains in immediate sustaining attentiveness to everythingthat exists, precisely in its ‘thisness.’” ~John Duns Scotus
The Incarnation of God did not happen in Bethlehem 2000 years ago. That is just when we started taking it seriously. The incarnation actually
happened 14.5 billion years ago with a moment that we now call “The Big Bang.” That is when God actually decided to materialize and to self expose.
Two thousand years ago was the human incarnation of God in Jesus, but before that there was the first and original incarnation through light, water, land, sun, moon, stars, plants, trees, fruit, birds, serpents, cattle, fish, and “every kind of wild beast” according to our own creation story (Genesis 1:3-25). This was the “Cosmic Christ” through which God has “let us know the mystery of his purpose, the hidden plan he so kindly made from the beginning in Christ” (Ephesians 1:9). Christ is not Jesus’ last name, but the title for his life’s purpose.
Jesus is the very concrete truth revealing and standing in for the universal truth. As Colossians puts it “he is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all creation” (1:15), he is the one glorious part that names and reveals the even more glorious whole. “The fullness is founded in him… everything in heaven and everything on earth” (Colossians1:19-20). Christ, for John Duns Scotus (1265/66-1308) was the very first idea in the mind of God, and God has never stopped thinking, dreaming, and creating the Christ. “The immense diversity and pluriformity of this creation more perfectly represents God than any one creature alone or by itself,” adds Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274) in his Summa Theologica (47:1).
For most of us, this is a significant shaking of our foundational image of the universe and of our religion. Yet if any group should have come to this quite simply and naturally, it should have been the three groups of believers that call themselves “monotheists”: Jews, Christians, and Muslims all believe that the world was created by one God. It would seem to follow therefore that everything, everything without exception, would
bear the clear imprint and likeness of the one Creator. Doesn’t that seem to follow? How could we miss that? After all, we believed that One God created everything out of nothing.
We must realize what a muddle we have got ourselves into by not taking incarnation and the body of God seriously. It is our only Christian trump card, and we have yet to actually play it! As Sally McFague states so powerfully, “salvation is the direction of all of creation, and creation is the very place of salvation” (The Body of God, p. 287). All is God’s place, which is our place, which is the only place and every place.
In the 4th century St. Augustine said that “the church consists in the state of communion of the whole world” (Ecclesiam in totius orbis communione consistere). Wherever we are connected, in right relationship, you might say “in love,” there is the Christ, the Body of God, and there is the church. But we whittled that Great Mystery down into something small, exclusive, and manageable. The church became a Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant private club, and not necessarily with people who were “in communion” with anything else, usually not with the natural world, animals, with non-Christians, or even with other Christians outside their own denomination. It became a very tiny salvation, hardly worthy of the name. God was not very victorious at all.
Our very suffering now, our condensed presence on this common nest that we have fouled, will soon be the ONE thing that we finally share in common. It might well be the one thing that will bring us together. The earth and its life systems on which we all entirely depend (just like God!) might soon become the very thing that will convert us to a simple Gospel lifestyle, to necessary community, and to an inherent and universal sense of the holy.
I know it is no longer words, doctrines, and mental belief systems that can or will reveal the fullness of this Cosmic Christ. This earth indeed is the very Body of God, and it is from this body that we are born, live, suffer, and resurrect to eternal life. Either all is God’s Great Project, or we may rightly wonder whether anything is God’s Great Project. One wonders if we humans will be the last to accept this.
“From the beginning until now, the entire creation has been groaning in one great act of giving birth, and not only creation, but all of us who possess the first fruits of the page 22
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By John F. Haught
TeilHard de cHardiN: acTiON, cONTeMPlaTiON, aNd THe cOSMOS
it is hard for me think about action and contemplation without calling to mind the scientist and religious thinker Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955). This great
French Jesuit is most famous for trying to show how our new scientific understanding can make a considerable difference when it comes to exploring what we should be doing spiritually with our lives.
For example, as Teilhard argued, evolution is not an obstacle to faith, as many contemporary Christians still claim, but the key within which all theology and spirituality must now be set. Biology, geology, paleontology, astronomy, astrophysics, and many other sciences have contributed to a startlingly new picture of the cosmos as a work in progress. It is within the picture of a universe still coming into being that we must now situate human life and our spiritual aspirations as well.
What then does our own existence before God mean, and what is our religious destiny? What should we be longing for, and how should we be shaping our desires, if our existence is inseparable from a cosmos still being created?
The connection of a scientifically informed cosmic awareness to the spiritual life was Teilhard’s main preoccupation throughout his adult life. Ordained a priest in 1911, he became a stretcher-bearer during World War I and received awards for his courage in battle. It was during his life in the trenches that much of Teilhard’s spiritual vision began to take shape. After the war and the completion of his studies in Paris, he journeyed to China where he became one of the most authoritative geologists in the Far East. It was there that he began to compose his great synthesis of science and faith, Le Phénomène Humain (1955; recently retranslated into English by Sarah-Appleton Weber as The Human Phenomenon, 1999). However, both
the Vatican and Teilhard’s religious superiors forbade its publication. It appeared in print only after his death in New York in 1955.
Snubbed by his own church during his lifetime, this great scientist and spiritual visionary has arguably turned out to be the most important Christian thinker of the past century. For those interested in the relationship of contemplation to action, I doubt that few writers have more to offer even today. Only time will assign Teilhard his proper place in the history of ideas, but to those of us who believe that Christianity—for the sake of its intellectual credibility and even its survival—must eventually come to grips with science, especially evolution, Teilhard will forever shine forth as a model of honesty, openness, and courage.
What then are Teilhard’s most important ideas? I shall sum them up, all too succinctly, in four points that tie into the general theme of the present issue of Radical Grace.
The whole universe is still coming into being.1. Teilhard has the distinction of being one of the first scientists in the 20th century to have realized that the entire cosmos is a momentous drama. The universe is not just a large stage where human beings are being tested so as to demonstrate their worthiness to inherit a heavenly reward. We now realize, thanks to science, that our species is part of a much larger and fascinating set of happenings than we had ever known about until quite recently. We are products of an immensely long and extravagantly creative cosmic process. After giving birth to the spheres of matter and life, the universe has recently exploded into “thought” by virtue of the evolution of human brains complex enough to be self-conscious. What then are we to do with our lives, and for what should we pray, once we fully appreciate that we are part of a still unfinished creation? The cosmic story has a direction.2. The general cosmic drift takes the form of an increase in organized physical complexity over immense spans of time. The cosmos seems to be converging toward Something or Someone “up ahead,” perhaps toward what we have traditionally thought of as “God.” The cosmic movement toward “Omega Point” is not predetermined or forced, and it allows for the play of chance and blindly operating physical laws. Nevertheless, the universe has undeniably made
right contemplation and right action, at least in the context of an unfinished universe, will nurture a radical openness to a fresh future of ongoing creation.
“progress” toward higher degrees of complexity over the course of deep time. It has already gone through pre-atomic, atomic, molecular, unicellular, multi-cellular, vertebrate, primate, and human stages of increasing complexity over the course of billions of years. Now, in human beings, with their extremely elaborate nervous systems and brains, matter has attained a higher degree of complexity than ever. Simultaneously, the universe has exploded into “thought.”The cosmic impulse to maximize complexity—3. and consciousness—is still going on. Notice the tendency toward increasing complexity now gathering momentum on a planetary scale as a result of developments in technology, education, economics, and global politics (not to mention the Internet). Even in the face of forces of destruction, despair, evil, and death, the earth is now becoming more complex, clothing itself in something analogous to a brain. A wider dimension of consciousness, corresponding to the increase in planetary complexity, is in the early stages of formation. Teilhard refers to this emergent phenomenon as the “noosphere.” He adds, however, that the ongoing creation of such an outcome requires an appropriate unifying force. It is here that he locates the attracting power of God and the evolutionary role of Christ. Theologically speaking, the evolving universe is the extended and still developing body of Christ. What this means is that Christian devotion to the cosmic Christ provides an incentive to “build the earth” and not just wait passively for heaven. Humans have an everlasting destiny in God, of course, but our own destiny is inseparable from the universe that has given birth to us. Salvation, as St. Paul had already anticipated (Rom. 8), means the fulfillment of an entire cosmos and not the harvesting of souls from “here below.”The ongoing creation of the universe, at least 4. from a terrestrial perspective, requires on our part the fervent and persistent practice of faith, hope, and love. One of the objectives of a cosmically informed spirituality is to contemplate how the practice of virtue might contribute to the ongoing creation of the universe. Right contemplation and right action, at least in the context of an unfinished universe, will nurture a radical openness to a fresh future of ongoing creation. The cosmically sensitive Christian contemplative will pray for the wisdom and grace to distinguish those human actions that can contribute to the ongoing creation of the universe from those that lead only to destruction. Obviously, today this would include special attention to justice and environmental responsibility.
This is no more than a snippet of Teilhard’s extremely rich synthesis of science and spirituality. To those interested in pursuing his ideas, my own recommendation is to start with a collection of his essays, such as The Future of Man or Human Energy, instead of plunging immediately into the much more difficult, though indispensable, The Human Phenomenon. Most important for those interested in action and contemplation is The Divine Milieu, an interpretation of spirituality framed by an evolutionary sense of the world. For a blunt presentation of his critique of the limitations of pre-scientific theology for spirituality today, see Teilhard’s book Christianity and Evolution.
John F. Haught, Phd, Senior Fellow, Science & Religion, Woodstock Theological Center, Georgetown University, was formerly Professor (1970-2005) and Chair (1990-95) in the Department of Theology at Georgetown University. His area of specialization is systematic theology, with a particular interest in issues pertaining to science, cosmology, evolution, ecology, and religion. He is the author of numerous books, articles, and reviews including his most recent book, Making Sense of Evolution: Darwin, God, and the Drama of Life.
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By Mary Jo Picha
lOVe gOd, lOVe creaTiON
On some level of consciousness, we all know that the planet and all life on it are in crisis. The reports of pollution in the air, the water, the soil, the unprecedented (in human history) rates of
extinction of animals and plants have almost become daily news. It isn’t that we aren’t aware of these realities; it is just that we are somehow numb to them. We are caught it seems in an intellectual debate about it, and as a result the import of these realties is not reaching our hearts.
The work of the Center for Action and Contemplation is built upon the life and inspiration of St. Francis of Assisi (1181/82 – 1226). Among his other roles, Francis, a Christian mystic, is deemed the patron saint of those who promote ecology, an icon of the emerging church movement and, most pertinent, a lover of God in all creation. So what does this mean?
For a moment, allow me to remove this sentimental view of Francis. What I find is a prophet who foresaw the coming destruction of the earth, who forewarned us that human behavior was the root of this destruction, and who showed us through his life the way to metanoia, or the necessary change of mind and heart needed to return to God in love through loving his creation.
With so much evidence, with prophets and mystics who modeled a better way, why are so many of us still on the fence about this? Why are we moving so slowly toward the necessary change? Those who are leading the faith-based effort toward a large scale awakening on this issue say it is because we have not truly, like Francis, fallen in love with God in creation. As Thomas Berry says, we still see nature as a collection of objects, rather than as our brothers and sisters whom we are to embrace in a true communion of subjects (The Great Work, Harmony/Bell Tower, 2000). Only love is strong enough to move us toward the change that is necessary to turn things around.
I feel we must explore the relationships between St. Francis, the global ecological crisis, our faith and our numbness (or acedia) in the hopes that we can intentionally clear some of the obstacles to our own love affair with God in creation.
Jungian analyst Robert Johnson says it is not generally the solution that is difficult; it is just that our resistance is strong. He says if we begin addressing any challenging situation by coming to the table with the truth, then what to do will become very clear (The Golden World [CD], Sounds True, 2008). Regardless of whether we choose to side with those who say Global Warming is real or with those who say it is unproven, there are other facts to consider. Just take 10 minutes to do your own research to see what has happened to our air, our water, our soil and the rest of life that depends upon these basic elements of this planet we call home.
In terms of following Christ, Francis stands out as one of the most sincere of followers. Often credited to Francis is the line, “Preach the gospel at all times and when necessary use words.” His life reflects for us a deep, passionate love that inspires us and also calls into question our own relationship with the Divine. Is it really possible for us to love God in
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creation as Francis did? Do we even desire to love God in this way? Are we willing to receive a call to simplify our lives and to know the implications for our daily lives of loving God in creation? It seems Francis, the mystics, and Christ whom they followed all are inviting us into this love affair with God and all are showing us the way. Are we ready to follow?
For many of us, this growing awareness of the global ecological crisis is distressing, not only because of what we are learning is happening to our planet, but also because many of the patterns of our daily way of life are implicated as contributing to the earth’s destruction. Many of us are waking up to our complicity and it is frightening. This isn’t what we intended in trying to pursue a good life.
What if the urging by others to recognize our complicity is not an accusation? What if we could admit that we have neglected our relationship with God in
creation and that the voices that are urging us to wake up to our acedia are those of the prophets of our time calling us to return to God? This is one of the great patterns of those who have gone before us and it is our pattern—to keep awakening to what we allow to separate us from the love of God.
Thomas Berry has said that it isn’t a question of whether or not nature will heal itself; the question is whether or not humanity will be around to participate in the healing (The Great Work). Let us choose life, not only for ourselves but for all that God has created. It is a time for honesty, a time for making amends, and a time to fall more deeply in love with God in creation.
Excerpted and edited from Falling in Love with Creation: Week One: Creation and Francis: A Love Affair, a CAC-produced 2010 Lenten Series.
Mary Jo Picha, on staff at the CAC, is currently on sabbatical.
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By Paula Gonzalez, sc
aWaKeNiNg TO THe Sacred
For those who know how to see, nothing is profane. Everything is sacred. ~Teilhard de Chardin
These words from Teilhard de Chardin can furnish profound guidance as we ponder the Sacred Web of Creation. Our times call us to develop
a broadened perspective on all the relationships which make up this magnificent web—those to God, to one another, and to the rest of the created universe. An exciting way to view living in this time of crisis is provided by Thomas Berry: “Shocked by the devastation we have caused, we are awakening to the wonder of a universe never before seen in quite the same manner.” We who were born in the 20th century have been given several wonderful lenses which can teach us “to see” wonders which no generation before us has seen! An insightful quotation from Karen Armstrong reminds us what scientific discoveries—seen through the eyes of faith—can do: “Cosmologists and physicists today can lead us to that attitude of silent awe of which the great contemplatives speak.” The “new cosmology” helps us see that Creation is a long story which the Eternal Creator has been “telling” for nearly 14 billion years. And we are integral parts of that story today! This calls us to an integrative, contemplative spirituality.
How might such a spirituality develop if seen through the lenses of humility, simplicity and charity? Since the word humility comes from the Latin word humus, it immediately reminds us that we are “earthlings.” For a long time there has been an inaccurate notion that all of “nature” is inferior to humanity and that we should strive to become as “spiritual” as possible in order
to be closer to God. Today we are conscious that God is calling us to be co-creators of a world which has never before existed—a world of harmony throughout the planet. In Renewing the Earth our bishops stated: “The Christian vision of a sacramental universe—a world that discloses the Creator’s presence by visible and tangible signs—can contribute to making the earth a home for the human family once again.” What if Jesus had chosen to come at this time? What kind of earthling would he be? What would his “spiritual life” be like? How would he relate to “the God within” and the God whom (since
If we look at how the living world is designed we can
have a better notion of the mystery of the
Trinity and a better understanding
of the Paschal Mystery.
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our catechism days) we have said is everywhere”? What would the natural world around him reveal about Divine Mystery—our God?
The dictionary entry for “simplicity” is defined as “the state of being simple.” The first word given in the dictionary for “simple” is “single.” Thus, I believe simplicity could mean single-mindedness. For Sisters of Charity, virtue can be found in the prayer which each of us recites daily: “Thy will be done on Earth, as it is in heaven.” For all of us, doing this is surely the aim of our vowed commitment. But how do we know how it is “done in heaven”? I believe it means “according to God’s plan.” The Eternal Creator’s original plan is clear if we look deeply at the magnificence of creation. As Meister Eckhart stated, “Every single creature is full of God—is a book about God.” And St. Thomas Aquinas’ reminder may be unexpected: “If we don’t understand creation correctly, we can’t hope to understand God correctly.” If we look at how the living world is designed we can have a better notion of the mystery of the Trinity and a better understanding of the Paschal Mystery. Every living creature is part of an ecosystem, which consists of three different communities: green plants, which capture sunshine and turn it into “food”; animals, which completely depend on the plants; and “decomposers,” which return all the “raw materials” to the green plants to keep the cycle going. Life cannot continue for any length of time unless these relationships are in balance. Our task today is to restore this balance where it has been disturbed. In a talk to the World Council of Churches, Klaus Toepfer, head of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) stated: “We have entered a new age—an age where all of us will have to make a new compact with our environment...and enter into the larger community of all living beings. A new sense of communion with planet Earth must enter our minds.”
“The charity of Christ urges us.” In pondering this for our times, we might consider another line from the prayer Jesus left us: “Thy kingdom come.” What might this mean today, especially when contemplating the Sacred Web of Creation? Thomas Berry speaks of
belonging to the “sacred Earth community”—which includes everything in the created universe. Perhaps our reality today calls us to drop the “g” in kingdom and beg God to help us understand that everything is interconnected—everything is related to everything else. All of God’s creatures together, living and non-living, make up the “kin-dom” of God—and we are living in it right now! What might happen if we realized that everything is “holy ground”? What if our catechism answer that “God is everywhere” became reality in our lives? Would this not call us to live in a constant attitude of reverence? Can St. Paul’s admonition to “pray always” actually be realized through “praying all ways”? Can every action we perform to advance the arrival of the “kin-dom” be seen as a “spiritual practice”?
It is becoming increasingly clear to many across the globe that the planetary ecological situation and the extreme inequities in today’s global societies are two sides of a single coin—all related to the current economic crisis. Humanity is at a dangerous crossroad, as the opening words of the Earth Charter proclaim: “We stand at a critical time in Earth’s history, a time when humanity must choose its future... a time of both great peril and great promise.” If we want the values of Jesus to be included in this rapidly emerging future, we must be actively involved in addressing this unprecedented challenge. When pondering the times in which we are privileged to live, how do you react to these words of Walter Brueggeman: “It is the task of prophetic imagination to bring people to engage the promise of newness that is at work in our history with God”? Let us be increasingly aware that God needs us and calls us to be co-creators of a new tomorrow!
Edited from a talk given by Paula González, sc, and used with permission.
Sr. Paula González, sc, Phd, a Sister of Charity of Cincinnati, is a futurist and environmentalist. Sr. Paula presented with Fr. Richard Rohr at the 2007 Great Chain of Being conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and will be the pre-conference workshop presenter for Creation as the Body of God, the CAC-sponsored summer 2010 conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Please visit www.cacradicalgrace.org for conference information and to register.
CAC 9-DAY INTERNSHIP
Through the practice of contemplative prayer and active engagement with challenging issues and marginalized people, you can become contemplative in your actions.Application process is required. Download an application form on www.cacradicalgrace.org.
2010 Dates
April 23-May 2 (full)
June 4-13
October 8-17
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By Bill Plotkin
SOUl: YOUr Place iN NaTUre
Nature—the outer nature we call “the wild”—has always been the essential element and the primary setting of the journey to soul. The soul,
after all, is our inner wilderness, the intrapsychic terrain we know the least and that holds our individual mysteries. When we truly enter the outer wild—fully opened to its enigmatic and feral powers—the soul responds with its own cries and cravings. These passions might frighten us at first because they threaten to upset the carefully assembled applecart of our conventional lives. Perhaps this is why many people regard their souls in much the same way they view deserts, jungles, oceans, wild mountains, and dark forests—as dangerous and forbidding places.
Our society is forever erecting barriers between its citizens and the inner/outer wilderness. On the outer side, we have our air-conditioned houses and automobiles,
gated communities and indoor malls, fences and animal-control officers, dams and virtual realities. On the inner side, we’re offered prescribed “mood enhancers,” alcohol, and street drugs; consumerism and dozens of other soul-numbing addictions; fundamentalisms, transcendentalisms, and other escapisms; rigid belief systems as to what is “good” and what is “bad”; and teachings that a paternal God will watch over us and protect our delicate lives.
But when we escape beyond these artificial barriers, we discover something astonishing: nature and soul not only depend on one another but long for one another, are, in the end, of the same substance, like twins or trees sharing the same roots. The individual soul is the core of our human nature, the reason for which we were born, the essence of our specific life purpose, and ours alone. Yet our true nature is at first a mystery to our everyday mind. To recover our inmost secrets, we must venture into the inner/outer wilderness, where we shall find our essential nature waiting for us.
Our soul is our true nature, but soul can also be thought of as our true place in nature. Each of us was born to occupy a particular place within the community that ecophilosopher David Abram calls the more-than-human world. We each have a unique ecological role, the
way we are meant to serve and nurture the web of life, directly or through our role in society. At the level of soul, we each have a specific way of belonging to the biosphere, as unique as any maple, moose, or mountain.
You can reclaim your membership as a natural being in a natural world. The easiest and most direct way to begin is to simply spend time outdoors, quietly, observantly, and gratefully. By innocently immersing yourself in nature, you will discover, in time, that nature reflects your soul, revealing your particular place in the more-than-human world.
You can count on wild nature to reflect your soul because soul is your most wild and natural dimension. Nature gives birth to your soul—and that of all other animals and plants on the planet. Your ego, on the other hand, is not born directly from nature, but rather from
the matrix of culture-language-family. Soul initiation is often described as a death and a second birth. Like entering a cocoon, your first ego dies and later a soul-rooted ego is birthed, not from culture this time but from the womb of nature.
Wild nature contains all the terrestrial patterns of belonging. Every niche of the world is filled with a life-form that perfectly fits there because it was born to do just that. The wilder the environment, the more complex and diverse it is, and the more likely it contains patterns of belonging that resonate with your destiny. No matter who you are, no matter what possibilities you contain, there are forms and forces in wild nature that will reflect the numinous nuances of your soul.
Mary Oliver, for example, writes:
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,the world offers itself to your imagination,calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting—over and over announcing your placein the family of things.¹
Your soul is both of you and of the world. Creation
You can count on wild nature to reflect your soul because soul is your most wild and natural dimension.
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cannot be full until you become fully yourself. Your soul corresponds to a niche, a distinctive place in nature, like a vibrant space of shimmering potential waiting to be discovered, claimed…occupied. Your soul is in and of the world, like a whirlpool in a river, a wave in the ocean, or a branch of flame in a fire. As the anthropologist-biologist-ecologist Gregory Bateson shows in his work, psyche is not separate from nature, it is part of nature.²
Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry (the mathematical cosmologist and the cultural historian, respectively) propose in their book The Universe Story that everybody and everything not only has a unique place in the world but is a unique place: Walt Whitman did not invent his sentience, nor was he wholly responsible for the form of feelings he experienced. Rather, his sentience is an intricate creation of the Milky Way, and his feelings are an evocation of being, an evocation involving thunderstorms, sunlight, grass, history, and death. Walt Whitman is a space the Milky Way fashioned to feel its own grandeur.³ The essence of the human soul cannot be separated from the wildness of nature. This is why an adequate psychology must be an eco-depth psychology. It’s no surprise, even in the contemporary world, that profound encounters with soul often occur during solitary wilderness sojourns, just as they did for the founders of the major religions: Moses on Mount Sinai, Jesus in the desert for forty days, Muhammad in a cave outside Mecca, Buddha under the bodhi tree. For inspiration and vision, we, too, must learn to search outside the customary world of the village, to wander again in the inner and outer wilderness.
Adapted by Bill Plotkin from Soulcraft: Crossing Into the Mysteries of Nature and Psyche by Bill Plotkin, Ph.D., New World Library, 2003.
Bill Plotkin, PhD, is an eco-depth psychologist, wilderness-based soul guide, and the founder of Colorado’s Animas Valley Institute. He is the author of Soulcraft: Crossing into the Mysteries of Nature and Psyche and Nature and the Human Soul: Cultivating Wholeness and Community in a Fragmented World. Visit him online at www.animas.org.
¹ Mary Oliver, from “Wild Geese,” in Dream Work (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1986), p.14. ² See Gregory Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry,Evolution, and Epistemology (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000) and Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity (New York: Bantam, 1980). ³ Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry, The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era—A Celebration of the Unfolding of the Cosmos (New York: HarperCollins, 1992), p. 40.
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gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions, the hallmark of the mystic, the source of all true art....it is a privilege to be alive in this time when we can choose to take part in the self-healing of our world. ~ Joanna Macy
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By Ilia Delio, osf
creaTiON aS THe BOdY OF cHriST
Whenever I teach a course on Francis of Assisi, I like to begin with the question, “where do you find God?” Most students hesitate to answer
because they want to point upward (and some do point in this direction) while the real answer is downward. “No,” they protest. “This answer cannot be correct.” To which I respond, “Really? Then you do not believe in the God of Jesus Christ because this God bends low in love. This God is the wind beneath our wings.” Thomas
Merton once wrote, “We cannot go to God because we do not know where God lives but God comes to us to be God with us.” Francis of Assisi knew the God who bends low in love. He met this God in the broken down Church of San Damiano and in the brokenness of his own life as well. Aiming to be a victorious knight in shining armor, he wandered into the dilapidated Church of San Damiano shortly after being wounded in the Battle at Collastrada. His dream of victory, power and
“A medieval missionary tells that he has found the point where heaven and Earth meet...”
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glory had been shattered. As Francis prayed before the Cross, he experienced the depth of God’s compassionate love for him and he wept at his own brokenness and failure to love beyond his ego-centric self. But this bending-low God of outpouring love would not let Francis shrivel up and die in his misery; rather he embraced him so closely that Francis could not help but surrender to this divine power of love visibly expressed in the surrender of Christ on the cross. As the Lover called to the Beloved, Francis surrendered to the Love of God and this surrender was the beginning of his conversion.
When Love takes hold of us, we begin to let go of the things we hold on to for security, the things we use to control our lives. We yield to Love and we let Love direct our lives—not blindly or foolishly—but, like a searcher of fine pearls ,we search for those places where Love hides so that we may be where Love is. Such was the life of Francis. As Love took hold of his heart, it opened his eyes to see the world with new vision. In the poor he saw an icon of Christ himself, in the leper he tasted the goodness of God, in tiny earthworms he saw the humility of God, and in the birds he saw the dignity of being a creature of God. Bonaventure described the world of Francis as an embrace of God. All of creation became for Francis the Body of Christ, a Eucharistic earth, with each creature expressing divine beauty in a unique and irreproducible way. Bonaventure wrote: “In beautiful things, Francis saw Beauty itself and through his vestiges imprinted on creation he followed his Beloved everywhere, making from all things a ladder by which he could climb up and embrace him who is utterly desirable” (Leg maj. 9.1). Francis followed the Beloved everywhere, every person, tree and
flower, every rabbit, bird, wolf and falcon, every creature and all the elements, sun, moon, stars, wind and fire, everything bore the seal of God’s love. He reverenced each and every creature as the very presence of Christ and he embraced each one passionately, returning love for love.
Bonaventure reflected deeply on the path of Francis and he grasped the saint’s inner spirit as one of incarnational truth: this world is holy because God has embraced it in love. The very life of God is a communion in love, a Trinity of persons dancing in love, a vibrant energy of love that flows out of the mouth of God as an eternal YES to creation. This YES swells up in the self-gift of love expressed in Jesus Christ. Bonaventure and John Duns Scotus held that Christ is first in God’s intention to love; the whole creation is made for Christ. Creation is not mere physical matter; rather, it expresses God’s infinite love. God “speaks” the depths of his heart in the rich diversity of creation. Earth is holy, a sacrament of God.
But how do we come to know the sacredness of this creation? How do we come to feel this Body of God so rich in diversity yet simple in unity? Bonaventure claimed the more deeply we come to know Christ at the center of our lives, the more deeply we come to know Christ at the heart of creation. His spiritual path rooted in poverty and humility is a stripping away and a clinging to God, a path that ultimately leads to the crucified Christ. In union with Christ Crucified, one is free to love and to give oneself away in love. The poor person is not insulated by layers of material things or systems of power and control; rather, the poor person sees all creation as gift. Poverty gives birth to wisdom when the stripping of intellectual power gives way to compassionate love. Wisdom is the inner eye of love that searches the depths of being to reveal what is lasting and true. As the eye of the heart is opened to truth, the wise person travels the earth slowly, taking nothing for granted, allowing each step to bring a new discovery of wonder and awe. The wise person sees that the wild and unpredictable earth reflects the wild, unpredictable God. This is the lesson of Francis. Only when we allow the pain of the world to touch us can we see this earth as the Body of God. Only then do we fall into the arms of love.
Ilia Delio, osf is a Senior Fellow of the Woodstock Theological Center, Georgetown University, concentrating in the area of science and religion. Prior to joining Woodstock, she taught at Washington Theological Union in the Department of Spirituality Studies. She is the author of Christ in Evolution, The Humility of God and co-author of Care for Creation: A Franciscan Spirituality of the Earth which won two Catholic Press Association Awards. Sr. Ilia will be presenting together with Fr. Richard Rohr at the CAC-sponsored summer conference, Creation as the Body of God, Summer 2010. For more conference information and to register, please visit www.cacradicalgrace.org.
The wise person sees that the wild and unpredictable earth reflects the wild, unpredictable God. This is the lesson of Francis.
“A medieval missionary tells that he has found the point where heaven and Earth meet...”
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By Daniel O’Leary
creaTiON, iNcarNaTiON, eUcHariST: THe ONe BOdY OF gOd
any consideration of orthodox liturgy must always be true to the Incarnation. It needs to avoid all strains of a dualism that keeps church worship
and creation apart. A truly traditional theology of liturgy insists that our ritual acts of worship should never be seen as isolated interventions of grace into our otherwise ‘merely’ secular lives and world. Rather are they the symbolic expressions of the holiness of creation itself.
The Eucharist carries sublime significance when understood as a celebration of life, the deepest symbol of the hidden meaning already burning in the core of creation. It is the liturgical expression of the living river of love that erupted at the beginning and now flows everywhere. That love sustains the cosmos of our hearts and the heart of our cosmos. In time and space, in bread and wine, the first divine love we call God, always incarnate in creation, is given new self-expression.
An astonishing God, already incarnate in creation, had waited for billions of years to achieve self-consciousness, had waited for her universal Presence to unfold from within, becoming flesh in the human heart and mind. Once this breakthrough was accomplished, creation then needed to celebrate its incredible life-story with its mysterious beginning, its hazardous evolution, its split-second timing, its relentless becoming. With the advent of humanity—its first and unique heart and mind—this became possible. And the Eucharist is one of its rich expressions, encapsulating the cosmic love-story forever.
In the sacramental mode, with bread and wine, the world is acknowledging its very being as flowing from the womb of God at the beginning of time and in each passing moment. Through the human voices, gestures, and symbolic elements and actions of its human children, the universe is in worship before its Creator, offering itself to its incomprehensible lover-God in the ecstasy of its joys and the bitterness of its sorrows.
The Eucharist brings to self-consciousness, identifies
and names for the universe, some of the deepest dimensions of its miraculous growth. It reflects back to creation the exciting revelations about its origins, its history, and its final destiny. For the Christian, in light of Incarnation, this is the central and stunning revelation that is celebrated in the Eucharistic drama.
In the words of Dr. John McQuarrie, this vision is revealed, clarified, purified, and celebrated at every true Eucharistic gathering “with a directness and an intensity
like that of the Incarnation itself.” In one ordinary sacramental moment, in a piece of daily bread and cup of wine, the mighty mystery of creation is encapsulated.
“Yes, cosmic!” John Paul II exclaims in Ecclesia de Eucharistia, “because even when the Eucharist is celebrated on the humble altar of a country church, it is always, in some way, celebrated on the altar of the world. It unites heaven and earth. It embraces, permeates and celebrates all creation.” In his Feast of Faith, he explains why “Christian liturgy must be cosmic liturgy, why it must, as it were, orchestrate the mystery of Christ with all the voices of creation.”
In the dynamic presence of the bread and wine on the table, the Christian symbolises just about everything that can be predicated of humanity, the earth and everything on and in it, the universe and the cosmos itself—the past ,present, and future of all creation. These rich and simple elements gather up the intense agony and ecstasy of the world, its darkness and light, its failures and possibilities,
The Eucharist carries sublime significance when understood as a celebration of life, the deepest symbol of the hidden meaning already burning in the core of creation. it is the liturgical expression of the living river of love that erupted at the beginning and now flows everywhere.
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The eternal words of disclosure are spoken: “This is my Body.” They sound around the earth, and they echo among the stars. They were whispered by our loving Mother when the terrible beauty of the fiery atoms shattered the infinite darkness with unimaginable flame and light.
“This is my Body.” It is God-become-atom, become-galaxy, become-star, become-universe, become-earth, become-human that speaks these words to her own human body in a human voice. It is a remembering, a reminding, and a confirming that the divine and the human, that nature and grace exist only in each other, that all are God’s one body by virtue of creation, first in time and hidden, but revealed later in the Incarnation, as God’s most beautiful desire from the very beginning.
When we eat the bread and drink the wine, we are identifying with the cosmos and with the Love that created and continues to create it. Theologian Sally McFague puts it this way: “In the metaphor of the world as the body of God, the resurrection becomes a worldly, present, inclusive reality, for this body is now offered to all: This is my Body.”
The Eucharist holds open the door to eternity. It is the same door to a human community of justice and peace, of environmental awareness, of respect and honour for every aspect of creation. “The only real fall of humanity,” wrote Alexander Shmemann, “is its non-eucharistic life in a non-eucharistic world.”
In one sense we are at the beginning now. There is another mission to be accomplished—a world to win, a universe to save, a cosmos to be at home in, a God to become one with. To live the Ritual. To be the Myth. To see and experience creation as the Body of God.
Something astonishing happens then. We sense a radiant energy coursing through the universe and through us—and all those powers are seamlessly one. Something beautiful is drawing us to the divine depths of things.
And wonder of wonders, we ourselves are fashioned so as to give expression to that radiance. We, in our limitedness, complete that limitless, invisible, ever-present beauty. We do it in the only way we can—by our faithfulness to the vision, by our daily integration of it and our often unaware expression of it. In our smile, our word, our touch, our new way of seeing and of being present, something in us starts to shine.
Daniel O’Leary, an Anglican priest of the Diocese of Leeds, England, is an author and teacher. Award-winning author of 12 books, he is a regular contributor to the Tablet and the Irish Furrow. His current project is about the recovery of what is called the sacramental imagination in all our spiritual endeavours—both our inner spiritual work and our many pastoral, educational ministries. Begin with the Heart, book and DVD, is published by Columba Press, 2008.
By Keith Douglass Warner, ofm
reTrieViNg ST. FraNciS: radical WiTNeSS FOr aN ecOlOgical age
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St. Francis of Assisi is widely acclaimed as the pre-eminent example of Christian care for creation. His radical Christian discipleship and passionate love
of creation represent an important example of religious ecological consciousness. By ecological consciousness I mean an awareness of our inescapable ecological interdependent relationship with the Earth, its elements and living organisms.2 Francis’ ecological consciousness influenced his religious imagination, his vision for moral living, his prayer and his preaching. His life gives witness to an ecological wisdom, to how we should live a good life in relationship to the Earth. His witness can inspire in us a vocational response. By vocation I mean responding with one’s whole life to God’s love and the needs of the world.
Francis’ care for creation is but one expression of his vocation, which was rooted in his passionate love of Jesus Christ. Francis was foremost a follower of Jesus, but in him there was no tension between loving God and loving all creatures of God. His life inspires faith in Jesus Christ and care for creation.
To make Francis’ witness meaningful in our contemporary culture, we have to undertake a retrieval process. Religious retrieval is a broad set of activities taking place across all faiths to select the most appropriate beliefs, human values, and ritual practices to re-present a religious identity to the modern world.3 The selective retrieval of traditions is a fundamental task in the Greening of Religions, because this is the chief feature that distinguishes religious environmentalism from other expressions of environmental concern.4
Francis’ relationship with creation should be understood within the broader context of his religious journey: its essential themes of passionate love for Jesus Christ, the desire to follow him, contemplative prayer, on-going conversion of life, and a spirituality of brotherhood with everyone and everything. Since the Second Vatican Council, scholars have emphasized Francis’ own writings because they convey his voice to us.5
Some of this new scholarship has addressed his relationship with the Earth, highlighting his love of animals and the elements. The most famous story is that of him preaching to the birds, but contemporary popularization of this in the form of “Francis-as-a-garden-statue” completely fails to recognize the radical significance of this encounter.6 The true significance of this story is that Francis awoke to the communion of life he shared with the birds, not that he preached to them. This encounter prompted Francis to further integrate his love of creation with his religious identity and responsibilities. Just as his storied encounter with a leper furthered his religious conversion, so did that with the birds. In ethical terms, non-human creatures facilitated an expansion of Francis’ moral imagination,
because they indicated to him the next set of tasks in his religious journey.7
Francis spent between one-third and one-half of each year praying with a few brothers in the wilderness.8 The early friars practiced contemplative prayer: the practice of responding to love by opening one’s heart and by deepening our awareness of God’s love for us. The Canticle of the creatures is a fruit of sustained contemplative spiritual practice, celebrating God’s love for us as expressed in the materiality of our embodied humanity. It cannot be properly understood apart from Francis’ love of Jesus Christ, as expressed through his devotion to the Incarnation and Passion, as experienced through his senses when praying in the wilderness. The Canticle discloses Francis’ recognition of creation as an expression of God’s generous love, and that creation has inherent value because it is created by God, not because of its material value to humans. This is true ecological wisdom.
The example of St. Francis can inspire us to respond to the cry of the Earth with love, compassion and generosity. We cannot mimic him, but we can draw from his example to live out a vocation animated by ecological consciousness. A contemporary vocational response can draw from Francis’ example, but will have to synthesize something new by combining inspiration, a contemporary moral vision, and the best scientific information. This is how we can best transit our tradition in an age of ecological crisis.Excerpted from Keith Douglass Warner, ofm, “Retrieving St. Francis: Tradition and Innovation for Our Ecological Vocation,” in Green Discipleship: Catholic Theological Ethics and the Environment, ed. Tobias Winright (Winona, MN: Anselm Academic, forthcoming 2011).
Keith Douglass Warner, ofm is a Franciscan Friar, a lecturer in the Religious Studies Department, and the Assistant Director for Education at the Center for Science, Technology & Society at Santa Clara University. He has taught classes on the interface between religious studies and environmental studies at SCU since 2004. His full teaching and research webpage is www.scu.edu/kwarner.
1. All texts of the writings by and about St. Francis are taken from Regis Armstrong OFM Capuchin, Wayne Hellman OFM Conventual, and William Short OFM, eds., Francis of Assisi: Early Documents, Volume I: The Saint (New York: New City Press, 1999). Subsequently referred to as FA: ED. The Canticle is on page 113-114. 2. Christopher Uhl, Developing Ecological Consciousness: Paths to a Sustainable World (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2004). 3. Jose Casanova, Public Religions in the Modern World (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1994). 4. Roger S. Gottlieb, A Greener Faith: Religious Environmentalism and Our Planet’s Future (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006). 5. Roger D. Sorrell, St. Francis of Assisi and Nature (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988). This is still the most definitive analysis of this subject. Subsequent work includes a fine collection of essays in Dawn M. Nothwehr, OSF, Franciscan Theology of the Environment: An Introductory Reader (Quincy Illinois: Franciscan Press, 2003). 6. Keith Douglass Warner, OFM, “Get Him out of the Birdbath!,” in Franciscan Theology of the Environment, ed. Dawn M. Nothwehr, OSF (Quincy, Illinois: Franciscan Press, 2002). 7. Thomas Nairn, OFM, “St. Francis of Assisi’s Canticle of the Creatures as an Exercise of the Moral Imagination,” in Franciscan Theology of the Environment, ed. Dawn M. Nothwehr, OSF (Quincy, IL: Franciscan Press, 2002). Nairn describes the Canticle as Francis exercising his moral imagination, meaning that he used his creativity to dream of how the elements could be related, and we can extend this to relationships he had with animals as well. 8. William J. Short, OFM, “Recovering Lost Traditions in Spirituality: Franciscans, Camaldolese and the Hermitage,” Spiritus 3 (2003).
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By Avideh Shashani
THe eTerNal rOSe
Once upon a time, God said, “I will create the most beautiful and fragrant flower that ever existed.” So, God thought and thought and, petal by petal, the ninety nine names of God unfolded into the most beautiful bloom. God looked at it and said, “How magnificent is my creation!” and gave of His own breath into the heart of our flower.
“You are the jewel of all flowers,” He said, and then withdrew.The tale of our flower was heard from shore to shore, and all creatures decided to travel from far and wide to see for
themselves this wonder of all creation. It didn’t take long before our flower was exposed to all the hazards of the world.Our flower missed her Beloved ever so much. Her laments spread through the stillness of the night and awakened
the stars from the slumber of the sky. The dewdrops from her sighs flowed and flowed until rivers formed through the mountains, valleys, and desert lands. Flowers began to bloom through all the places that these rivers ran. Butterflies and bees became the regular visitors of these beautiful lands. Birds decided to flock and take part of the abundance that had sprung from the earth and sky.
Pretty soon, our flower—so innocent and sublime—became the envy of all creatures in sight. Day after day, everyone’s burdens piled up on her fragile, slender, and tender silhouette.
Day and night she talked in her heart to her Beloved. She’d say,
“My God, you made me so beautiful and fragrant. From innocence and splendor you’ve shaped my every petal, and your breath that brought me to life intoxicates every passerby. The hue of love that penetrates each heart-shaped petal bedazzles all eyes that behold my beauty, ever unsurpassed. My head is turned to the heavens and in Your remembrance I spend all the moments of every day. But, I have no peace. I have no protection. I’m exposed to all the hazards of the world. I am so far away from my home. Help me, my Beloved, help me to endure the world!”
Our beautiful flower began to look more frail with each passing day. But, she stood tall and kept lamenting of the world to her beloved God. She knew she had to be patient, for God had said, “I answer the call of whoever calls Me from the heart.”
The days went by and the nights stood still until one day our flower saw a luminous figure approaching from far in the distance. His steps were steady and his gaze was fixed and before she knew it, he stood by her side. He looked at her with his penetrating eyes and asked, “What is it that brings so much lament from your heart my dearest one?” Our beautiful flower sighed the deepest sigh and began to tell, word for word, the tale of her life. When she had finished telling of her sorrow, he asked, “If you could make any wish, what would it be?” “I’ve always had only one wish,” she declared and one by one all ninety nine petals began to unfold, laying bare the wish that had been branded in the core of her heart. She saw the figure come closer and closer and whisper the highest secret in her heart. When he had finished, he kissed the petal that cradled her heart.
In moments our flower felt a deep peace move through every petal that surrounded her heart. She began to hum and hum and in a drunken ecstasy she swayed to and fro until slumber enveloped all her pains away. When she opened her eyes, to her surprise, she saw that her slim body had acquired some new growth—they were thorns! She wondered why. She spent many days reflecting about the visit, the thorns, and the deep peace that now embraced her soul. Then she remembered the highest secret that had been whispered in her heart—it was the hundredth name of God. Who else but God knows the secret of the Rose and the mystery of the thorns!
© 2009 by Avideh Shashaani, July 12, 2009.
Avideh Shashaani, Phd is the founder and president of the Fund for the Future of our Children (FFC), a non-profit organization based in Washington, DC dedicated to developing innovative educational and multicultural programs that encourage and empower children and youth to be agents of peace in local and global environments. She promotes intercultural and interfaith understanding through lectures, workshops, and publications. She is the author of three books, Promised Paradise (poetic prose), Remember Me (poetry), and Tell Me Where to Be Born (poetry).
She began to hum and hum and in a drunken ecstasy she swayed to and fro until slumber enveloped all her pains away.
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By John Hartigan
iN TaNdeM, THe MaN aNd THe Tree
dawn’s morning mist, trained so well by the early sun, departed Moncks Corner with a hush and a final kiss. And there framed in a statuesque symmetry were a Mepkin man and a towering tree. They stood there motionlessly…in contemplation…staring at each other…and listening too to one another. But neither
breathed a word.The old tree had survived more than a century of wear and tear, attacked by hurricanes and the vagaries of unfriendly
elements. Its trunk gnarled and snarled, wore the scars and wrappings of a barking old age. Its limbs were looped and stooped by their propensity to grow and fulfill their call to stretch ever more beyond their yesterdays. Unquestionably, its roots ran deep and sure to tap the inner spring that fed it by day and by night. The old tree solemnly held high its head.
In attentive rapture stood the lean Mepkin man, nodding to the towering tree with a respect due his elders. Bent a bit from waist on up, garbed in tunic and cowl of the Trappist monk, the Mepkin man acknowledged his friend of thirty odd years. A most striking calm mien marked his face silhouetted by a silvery beard. His roots were formed in study, prayer and work by day and by night. The Mepkin man stood mighty still.
As they listened to each other in an unusual quiet dialogue shared by man and tree, the wonder of it all ascended to greet the sun, sky and all living creatures within their sight. They heard in the background of their quietude the symphonic songs of love that God sings for all His creatures wherever they are. They moved not a foot for a long, long time.
John Hartigan is a retired Vice President for Finance and Business at the University at Albany. He has used a passion to write to help non-profit organizations and to create children’s’ fantasy books including Kendal the Baker Bee (Castle Keep Press, 2007). Please visit www.johnhartigan.com for more information.
Great Spirit, by Thomas Vorce
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By Mary Evelyn Tucker
THe alliaNce OF WOrld religiONS aNd ecOlOgY
iNTrOdUcTiON
The world’s major religions are often regarded as preservers of traditional views and behaviors, and thus conservative in their outlooks. What
should not be overlooked, however, is that religions can also be liberating, and thus capable of provoking social change. Although religions have initially been slow to respond and do not immediately spring to mind as catalysts for environmental action, the moral authority and institutional power of the world’s religions make them well-situated to help effect a change in attitudes, practices, and public policies in respect to sustainability.
Clearly religions have a central role in the formulation of worldviews that orient humans to the natural world and the articulation of rituals and ethics that guide human behavior. In addition, they have institutional capacity to affect millions of people around the world. Religions of the world, however, cannot act alone with regard to new attitudes toward environmental protection and sustainability. The size and complexity of the problems we face require collaborative efforts both among the religions and in dialogue with other key domains of human endeavor, such as science, economics, and public policy. Religions are late in coming to environmental issues and thus need to work in conjunction with scientists and policy makers.
THe NaTUre OF religiON Religion is more than simply a belief in a transcendent
deity or a means to an afterlife. It is, also, an orientation to the cosmos and our role in it. Religion thus refers to cosmological stories, symbol systems, ritual practices, ethical norms, historical processes, and institutional structures that transmit a view of the human as embedded in a world of meaning and responsibility, transformation and celebration. Religion connects humans with a divine or numinous presence, with the human community, and with the broader Earth community. Religion thus situates humans in relation to both the natural and human worlds with regard to meaning and responsibility.
Religions have been significant catalysts in coping with change and transcending suffering while at the same time grounding humans in nature’s rhythms. The creative tensions between humans seeking to transcend this world and yearning to be embedded in it are part of
the dynamics of religions. This realization leads to a more balanced understanding
of the possibilities and limitations of religions regarding environmental concerns. Many religions retain otherworldly orientations toward personal salvation outside this world; at the same time they have fostered commitments to social justice, peace and ecological integrity in the world. There are new alliances emerging now that are joining social justice with environmental justice. Concern for how poor communities are being adversely affected by climate change has given rise to intense discussions regarding “climate justice.”
THe acadeMic Field OF religiON aNd ecOlOgY
From 1996-1998, an international conference series took place at Harvard University’s Center for the Study of World Religions (CSWR). The goal was to examine the varied ways in which human-Earth relations have been conceived in the world’s religions. The project was launched to provide a broad survey that would help to ground a new field of study in religion and ecology. Acknowledging the gap between ancient texts and traditions and modern environmental challenges, it drew on a broad method of retrieval, reevaluation, and reconstruction.
The Harvard conferences were also designed to foster interdisciplinary conversations that drew on the synergy of historians, theologians, ethicists, and scientists as well as on the work of grassroots environmentalists. A spirit of collaborative scholarship rather than individualistic research emerged naturally in the conferences. Individual traditions, scholars, and projects were seen as part of larger and long-term efforts for the flourishing of life on the planet for future generations. This research project assumed that religions could contribute toward a more sustainable future, but that multidisciplinary approaches were needed.
The edited papers from these conferences have been published in ten volumes by CSWR and distributed by Harvard University Press (www.hup.harvard.edu).
The Forum on Religion and Ecology arose from these conferences and was formed at a culminating conference at the United Nations in 1998. The Forum is now based at Yale University where it maintains a comprehensive
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website and sends out a monthly newsletter (www.yale.edu/religionandecology). In addition, there is now a master’s program in religion and ecology at Yale between the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and Yale Divinity School. The Forum continues to work within and outside academia to encourage the development of religious environmentalism.
cONclUSiONWithin the last 15 years, the relationship between religion and
ecology has emerged as both an academic field as well as an engaged force in environmental issues. No doubt it will continue to grow as interest is increasing among students, clergy, and lay people.
The common values that most of the world’s religions hold in relation to the natural world might be summarized as reverence, respect, restraint, redistribution, responsibility, and renewal. While there are clearly variations of interpretation within and between religions regarding these principles, it may be said that religions are moving toward an expanded understanding of their cosmological orientations and ethical obligations. Although these principles have been previously understood primarily with regard to relations toward other humans, the challenge now is to extend them to the natural world. As this shift occurs—and there are signs it is already happening—religions can advocate reverence for the earth and its profound cosmological processes, respect for the earth’s myriad species, an extension of ethics to include all life forms, restraint in the use of natural resources combined with support for effective alternative technologies, equitable redistribution of wealth, the acknowledgement of human responsibility in regard to the continuity of life and the ecosystems that support life, and renewal of the energies of hope for the transformative work to be done.
Edited article used with permission of the author.
Mary Evelyn Tucker, Phd, is a Senior Lecturer and Senior Scholar at Yale University where she has appointments in the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies as well as the Divinity School and the Department of Religious Studies. Dr. Tucker is the author of Worldly Wonder: Religions Enter Their Ecological Phase, Moral and Spiritual Cultivation in Japanese Neo-Confucianism and The Philosophy of Qi. She edited several of Thomas Berry’s books, including Evening Thoughts, The Sacred Universe, and Christian Future and the Fate of Earth. For more information on the work of Dr. Tucker, please visit www.yale.edu/religionandecology.
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• EngagE in a spiritual formation program rooted in the integration of action and contemplation.
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Radical Grace Goes Green
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Spirit, we also groan inwardly, as we wait for our bodies to be set free” (Romans 8:22-23). It seems that St. Paul is saying here that we human ones might be the last ones to jump aboard God’s great plan. There is the groaning of growing in all of creation, and the groaning of resisting and “waiting” in us humans.
All of creation, it seems, has been obedient to its destiny, “each mortal thing does one thing and the same. . .myself it speaks and spells, crying ‘What I do is me, for that I came’” (Gerard Manley Hopkins, When Kingfishers Catch Fire). Wouldn’t it be our last and greatest humiliation, surely the “first being last” (Matt. 20:16), if we one day realized that all other creatures have obeyed their destiny unblinkingly and with trustful surrender. Watch the plants and animals!
It is only humans who have resisted “the one great act of giving birth,” and in fact have frequently chosen death for themselves and for so many others.
Fr. Richard Rohr, the Founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is the author of numerous books including The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See (Crossroad 2009). He is a regular contributor to Radical Grace.
creaTiON aS THe . . . Continued from page 3
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nAPR 8 (THu)Albuquerque, New Mexico Emerging Christianity Pre-Conference Workshop Shane Claiborne and Richard Rohr
APR 9-11 (fRI-SAT)Albuquerque, New MexicoEmerging Christianity ConferenceCynthia Bourgeault, Diana Butler Bass, Brian McLaren, Richard Rohr
MAY 1-2 (SAT-SuN)Cape Town, South AfricaContemplative Outreach Retreat
MAY 3-5 (MoN-WED)Cape Town, South AfricaRetreat for Spiritual Directors Center for Christian Spirituality
MAY 7-9 (fRI-SuN)Cape Town, South AfricaM.A.L.Es.: From Wild Man to Wise Man
MAY 10-12 (MoN-WED)Cape Town, South AfricaRestoring Male Spirituality in Family, Church and Society
JuNE 9 (THu)Nazareth, MichiganChristian Awakening and ContemplationTransformations Spirituality Center
JuNE 11-13 (fRI-SuN)Kalamazoo, MichiganFetzer Institute (closed)
JuNE 14 (MoN)Chicago, Illinois The 21st Century DiscipleLoyola university
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The Soul, the Natural World, and What ISRichard shows the crucial importance for each person to encounter their deepest self, their soul. Our primary task is to encounter our soul, awaken it, and trust it. Before a soul encounter, our ego is an agent for itself; after a soul encounter, the ego is a servant of the soul. Daily contact with nature is the best way to re-connect with soul. 1CD / MP3 $8.00
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a NeW CoSMoloGy: NaTure aS The fIrST BIBle This program is an excerpt from a 2009 retreat in Assisi, which communicates the essence of the “Great Chain of Being,” and offers a glimpse of a ‘new cosmology’ that will help people of faith appreciate the importance of living in harmony with God’s creation. Fr. Richard gives some practical instruction on how to do this. 2 CDs / MP3 $15.00
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Honor and experience the Oneness • of ALL God’s Creation
Enter with the Earth into the • transformative space of suffering
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Develop and strengthen our own • prophetic voices to bring about the renewal of the face of the Earth through compassionate action
Live from the soul-centric rather • than the ego-centric
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