Note: You can watch this teaching on CrossWalk’s YouTube channel.
Process Questions for Session 2: Eco-Spirituality*
Introduction to Eco-Spirituality
1. What do you understand to be the connection between ecology and spirituality?
2. When have you witnessed the bond between ecological concern and spirituality being positive for creation, including humanity? Conversely, when have you witnessed it being less positive for the creation?
3. How is your knowledge of God related to your relationship with the environment?
4. Take a moment to write your own definition of eco-spirituality in the space provided here
The Mouth that Rohr’d
In the course of his initial presentation, we hear Richard Rohr speak boldly about many issues of both alternative orthodoxy and ecospirituality. You will remember much of what he said. Here is a selection to inspire group conversation:
Richard on individualism:
The single biggest heresy that allows us to misinterpret the scriptural tradition is individualism, revealed now in the problem we are facing with earth care, with sustainability, with animal species dying off. We became so anthropocentric that God cared not about the new heaven and the new earth, but “just us” and, as I said, not very many of us. That’s what happens when you go down the track of individualism and lose the mystical level of perception.
Richard on the Franciscan worldview:
Francis is the first recorded Western Christian who granted animals, elements and planets subjectivity, respect and mutuality by calling them brothers and sisters. It’s a participatory universe that Francis expresses with wind, with fire, with Sun and Moon; the whole universe is a participatory experience.
Richard on incarnation:
You’d think that Christianity would have got incarnation early and first because we’re the only religion that concretely believes that the Divine took on flesh. No one else claims that the Divine became a human being. But much of our history has been ex-carnation, that is, how to get out of the world. We didn’t get incarnation except in a very narrow sense. And now we’re paying the price for it: the huge dying off of species and the pollution of the earth.
Richard on cosmology:
Cosmology is the new name for theology. Like no other generations, we know the extent of the mystery of the universe. We can give a date for its beginning. Ninety-nine percent of it is emptiness, is silence, is space and is darkness—all the things we avoid, run from and deny as important. God created a universe that is mostly dark, empty, silent space! Does that have anything to teach consciousness? Until you can honor silence you don’t know how to interpret the particles inside the spaces. They have no meaning except in the relationship between them.
Richard on mysticism:
The emphasis on the individual reflects the lack of the mystical level. Mysticism is always about more and more connecting. You realize that you are participating in something bigger and you are part of a mystery. You wonder if the one thing we all share in common across all religions is that we’ve all stood on this same earth and we’ve all looked up at this same Brother Sun, Sister Moon. Could it be that the mystery is already encapsulated there?
Richard on the “first Bible”:
The early Franciscans called creation “The First Bible.” If you murdered and mangled and manipulated and did not attend to or respect the First Bible, the assumption was that you would murder, mangle and manipulate the second Bible. You could make the case that the Bible has done as much damage in human history as it has done good.
Richard on religion and ecology:
I can’t give up on religion. Religion grants inherent sacrality, inherent holiness, goodness, value and worthiness to the material world. No religion does that better in theory than Christianity. But we individualized it—we pulled it into our private human selves, and we didn’t have the mature eyes to see that it isn’t only I that have materiality, but my dog has it too and those trees have it. They share in that same material universe that I share. It creates a truly global spirituality of which humanity is capable. We’re not just capable of it; if we don’t get it, we’re in trouble
1. Richard Rohr is one of the most widely read Christian theologians in North America today. He has a large and enthusiastic following. As you can see and hear, he doesn’t mince words. Many folks would say, “This is exactly the kind of bold and prophetic leadership we need in Christianity today!” What do you think?
2. From the various things you have heard Richard say, what one thing would you take and share with friends? Try putting that into your own words and saying it to friends in this circle of learning right now.
What Are We To Do?
Jennifer asks Richard: “So what are we to do?”
Suzanne speaks of how, when it comes to ecological crises such as the oil spill in the Gulf, she is torn between “mopping up” and “changing the mindset”:
If we get into the mopping up, it’s just a vicious cycle of fixing the problems they generated as opposed to following the vision of St. Francis.
In his response Richard proposes three ways of moving forward in deepening our eco-spiritual consciousness while addressing our theological dysfunction:
A lot of us have been saying in recent years that much of our teaching is unlearning. That’s why I resort to the teaching of contemplation so much because contemplation in practice is a daily exercise in self-emptying, in detaching, in unlearning your learned patterns.
We have to grant a kind of humility to religion again because it hasn’t been very humble.
We do well to emphasize an optimistic worldview. We need something to be for much more than something to be against. You need a great big positive vision to seduce the soul out. To simply operate out of pure praise, glory and love—that’s a higher level of motivation, but one that doesn’t easily come our way.
1. How would you apply these strategies to your situation both personally and communally?
2. What other strategies would you offer to move us beyond the dire situation that Richard earlier describes?
Developing Contemplative Seeing
Raymond recalls times when he has been surrounded by the awesomeness of nature. There he notices the sublime reality that we humans are just one of millions of species on this planet and not necessarily here forever. At such times the truth of God’s everywhere presence in creation settles into him.
In response Richard reflects on contemplative seeing, describing it as:
An open-eyed reverencing of reality—seeing that it all has value without label, without functional purpose. Experiencing universal connection, reverence and awe, I walk into that massive canyon, the rock soaring above. I am humbled. It was here long before me and it will be here long after. I’m walking through it this day. Who am I to think that I name it; perhaps it’s naming me!
1. When are you captivated by the awe of creation in the way Raymond and Richard describe?
2. What are your practices for developing your contemplative seeing?
3. What mystical insights have come to you through contemplative seeing?
Incarnation, Grace, and Evolution
When someone introduces the topic of evolution into the conversation, Richard seizes the opportunity to use it to further illuminate the potential of incarnation fully realized:
You would have thought if we had understood incarnation, Christians should have been on the front lines of understanding evolution, because grace is inherent to creation. We’re the ones who believe God created all things, and yet grace was still extrinsic to the universe. So evolution was not in our natural understanding.
Francis took incarnation to its logical conclusion. That’s what makes us a minority position inside the church. Even though mainline Catholicism was sacramental and supposedly saw the physical world as a doorway into the spiritual world, by and large most Catholics also saw grace as extrinsic to the universe: God who occasionally visited and gave you grace. The light didn’t shine from inside! That’s why we weren’t prepared for evolution—and even fought it.
1. How do you see it: God’s grace intrinsic to the universe, including the whole journey of evolution, or extrinsic and occasionally granted?
2. What does evolution tell you about God?
Transformation and Church Structures
Doug acknowledges his excitement at everything that Richard is saying, but then wonders as a parish priest:
How do you get people to calm down enough to understand what contemplation really is, to undergo the transformation of consciousness that enables them to look at their dog and say, “This is a fellow creature”?
In his response Richard moves us into an examination of the insufficiency of current church structures:
We need structures that encourage people at the mystical level, because that is the level that Jesus is at. If you want to understand Jesus, you’ve got to have an openness to it or you pull him down into dualistic thinking: either/or, for me or against me.
People come to church with the expectation not to be changed; it’s to be told again what they already agree with. The structure itself doesn’t lend itself to transformation. The future isn’t in the large congregation because it doesn’t come with the expectation of transformation, grace and growth. It doesn’t come with “beginner’s mind.”
1. In what ways is your church’s structure facilitating or inhibiting change and transformation?
2. How badly do you want to be transformed into the Way of Jesus? What might it cost you?
3. What kind of faith community activity and structure would support you in your desire for transformation?
Transcend and Include
In response to Doug’s weariness with the extent of anxiety at the future of the church and his observation that there is more obvious spiritual discipline in spiritually-focused groups outside the church than inside, Richard introduces Ken Wilber’s principle, Transcend and Include. He adds his own formulation when he says, “If you have transcended, you can include.”
As a way of making this principle even more concrete, Richard presents the way that Francis modeled it:
In 13th century Italy, Catholicism was the only game in town, so Francis found a way to survive inside it but did it very differently. He moved outside the walls of Assisi and he didn’t fight the Bishop and priests inside the walls. He would still go to those churches on feast days and occasions, but he did it differently.
Richard sums up the conversation in naming one of the principles of his Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque:
The best criticism of the bad is the practice of the better.
1. What does living the principle of “Transcend and Include” look like for you and for others who share your frustrations, concerns and visions within the current structures of church?
2. In what ways are you actually living “the practice of the better” as a positive way of moving beyond that which needs to be left behind
Personal Reflection
Following the session you will continue to think about issues raised both on the video and in your small group. This suggestion for journaling is offered to support you in continuing your reflection beyond the session time.
1. You may not have had time in the session to address all the topics. Go back on your own to the ones you missed and reflect personally on the issues addressed there.
2. How will you honor and advance the contemplative part of your life? There are so many opportunities: yoga, centering prayer, Buddhist mindfulness, meditation of many kinds, chanting, worship in the style of Taize, spiritual direction, Celtic walking, healing touch and so much more. Consider that there may be merit in inviting other members of the group—or of your congregation—into an intentional practice of contemplative formation.
* Adapted from Embracing an Alternative Orthodoxy: A 5-Session Study by Richard Rohr with Tim Scorer, Morehouse Education Resources, 2014)