Ecospirit
Religions and Philosophies for the Earth
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We hope—even as we doubt—that the environmental crisis can be controlled. Public awareness of our species’ self-destructiveness as material beings in a material world is growing—but so is the destructiveness. The practical interventions needed for saving and restoring the earth will require a collective shift of such magnitude as to take on a spiritual and religious intensity.
This transformation has in part already begun. Traditions of ecological theology and ecologically aware religious practice have been preparing the way for decades. Yet these traditions still remain marginal to society, academy, and church.
With a fresh, transdisciplinary approach, Ecospirit probes the possibility of a green shift radical enough to permeate the ancient roots of our sensibility and the social sources of our practice. From new language for imagining the earth as a living ground to current constructions of nature in theology, science, and philosophy; from environmentalism’s questioning of postmodern thought to a garden of green doctrines, rituals, and liturgies for contemporary religion, these original essays explore and expand our sense of how to proceed in the face of an ecological crisis that demands new thinking and acting. In the midst of planetary crisis, they activate
imagination, humor, ritual, and hope.
The convenors and editors chose to focus on the relation between environmentalism and post-modernism, an increasingly important engagement for eco-theology.---—ESSSAT-News
This book is a rare combination of intelligence and vision. Its essays
---—Roger S. Gottlieb, author of A Greener Faith: Religious Environmentalism and our Planet's Future and A Spirituality of Resistance; Worcester Polytechnic Institute
deserve to be read--and reread--by scholars of religion, environmentalists,
students, and anyone who values the sacredness of the earth.
Ecospirit is best described as state-of-the-art in its field. All the essays in Ecospirit start at the cutting edge of the interdisciplinary responses to the ecological crisis and push critical questions about the effectiveness of contemporary scholarship and activism.---—Comptes rendus
This wide-ranging volume embraces poetry, interfaith liturgies, ecological readings of biblical and theological texts, and philosophical analyses of our place in the natural world, all in the service of transforming our ecological attitudes and practices.---—The Christian Century
. . . an inclusive affirmation of the need for and the commitment to change.---—ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment
Ecospirit inspires new converstaions and opens fresh avenues of insight contributing to Creation's healing.---—Norman Wirzba, Georgetown College
Challenging, inspiring, and subversive.---—David Barnhill, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh
Essays that offer a theological perspective on the environment and its protection.---—The Chronicle of Higher Education
A remarkable volume, given the current debate and eco-crisis." OR
---—Larry Rasmussen, Union Theological Seminary
"Ecospirit is cutting-edge work for just the right moment! Every direction taken in this collection moves the discussion forward in re-theorizing nature, our place in it, and our critical practices. I strongly will use this volume at every opportunity.