What is ecotheology and why is it important?

There are many discussions relevant to the planetary crisis, and one very important topic is ecotheology. I decided to interview my friend, Dale Lature, who has studied this important topic for a long time; together we explored its definition, significance, his inspirations and mentors, and the challenges it faces. 

It's a wide-ranging discussion, full of references for anyone wanting to research further; however, it was the challenges in the US Christian community that really stood out as a massive obstacle to overcome. The politicization of religion is something those of us not in the US have been trying to get our heads around. Dale provides some really interesting insights here. 

You can follow Dale’s work here http://ecoecclesia.org/ 

Here he is on X https://x.com/dlature 

And here he is on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/dalelature/ 

#UncommonCourage #Ecotheology 

To get in touch with me, all of my contact details are here https://linktr.ee/andreatedwards

My book Uncommon Courage, an invitation, is here https://mybook.to/UncommonCourage

My book 18 Steps to an All-Star LinkedIn Profile, is here https://mybook.to/18stepstoanallstar

Transcript

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Uncommon Courage should be everywhere. Uncommon Courage. Welcome to Uncommon Courage, the podcast. I don't do a lot of these these days. I'm focused on the live streams, but there's some really cool people I know that operate outside of the time zone. That makes it a respectable time for them to join the shows. So I might do a few more. And today we are going to talk about eco theology. Now, if you don't know me, I was brought up in a Catholic family and I rejected it outright. So I am not part of any organized religion, but I have respect for all faiths and eco theology wasn't really a subject that I'd come across before. And I met this chap called Dale Lature, and I actually have to ask him if I'm saying his surname right. And he's part of a community called the Climate Crisis Club that I'm part of. And every time he speaks, he really sort of, he makes me think. And I thought it'd be really great to expose everybody else to this lovely, lovely gentleman and we. Hopefully we can all get a bit of a better understanding of eco theology. So I'm going to introduce you now. Here is Dale. Did I say you said I'm correctly. Lature. Yeah. Oh, good. I forgot to ask you. Anyway, we are seeing each other for the first time. It's usually late on a Saturday night, and all I ever hear is your voice. So I see your face and you've got a much bigger beard than you have in your profile photo. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've seen you on, on some of your shows, but. Yeah, yeah, right. Well, you're. You're cheating. Yeah. So just to. Just to kick it off, you've got a fantastic story and you've done lots and lots of different things just to give people a sense especially of the religious journey that you've been on as well. So people know that you're coming at this from a very, very deep place. So do you want to kick it off? I'm gonna, I'm gonna highlight you. Okay. Yeah, yeah. So I grew up in, you know, one of the more conservative strands of American Christianity. It wasn't as conservative then as it is as it became later, but that's the Southern Baptist tradition. It's, you know, now well known as a. As is a very, you know, right wing place. And that kind of, that kind of took off when I was in seminary. So it was an interesting time to be in seminary because the, the denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, was changing dramatically. That was in the 80s. But just prior to that, like when I, my family moved all around. We lived in Alabama, West Virginia, and then Kentucky. And we, and we were in Kentucky my high school years and all throughout my college years. And I went to college in Western Kentucky at Murray State, where my dad went. And that's where I was born when my dad was in, you know, graduating from college in 1956. And. And so I went back there, as did my two brothers. And in Owensboro, Kentucky, which is a town in western Kentucky on the Ohio river, we moved there in 1970 when I was starting high school, like the summer, at the beginning of the summer before I started high school. And, and so my parents, you know, looking about for, you know, what church to join the youth group at First Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky, had, had been on, on a mission trip. And so they were just fresh off of that and they were like leading the Southern Baptist do Sunday night as well as Sunday morning. So on Sunday nights they tend to do more laid back kind of stuff. And so they had the youth lead the service and they, and they had, you know, a few testimonies in a Sunday morning because it was just bubbling over so much and they had to include something about that. But so my parents saw that and heard the testimonies and met the youth minister and they said, this is the place that we ought to come. And, you know, that was sort of the priority over, you know, how. Well my dad liked the preacher, which he liked, you know, he liked him fine too. I remember him saying, you know, several times, he's the best I've ever heard. But that youth minister exposed all of us to so many diverse theological expressions. And, and I, I credit that, you know, forever, you know, for, for the journey that I, that, that I undertook and one of the major ones. And so you, you asked me about books and resources and so I'm always ready to grab stuff off myself. In fact, in the back there, you can see up to the left of me, the, there's books leaning over because I've got all these books off that bookshelf and there's like several shelves above that that have books leaning over because I've got like probably about 20 books sitting out here around me. But this, this book is called Call and Commitment. And it's, you know, ragged because it was in my grandfather's library who was a Baptist preacher, my mom's dad, that was in Katie's, Kentucky. And for, for some reason, I mean, I, I would, you know, I was 10 years old when, when he died and Then, you know, I remember them loading up books into the back of the car and the. And the car, like, you know, almost hitting the ground in the back because there were so many books in the trunk. And. And they were taking them off to give them away to, you know, used bookstores or. I don't know what they gave them to, but a few of the books ended up at our house. And. And I guess my dad was interested in this because of call commitment, and it was about a church, and I don't think he ever read it, but I remember seeing it on our bookshelf and just, you know, didn't even think about it much later until some people in my youth group, because my youth minister had told us about this church, and it's Church of the savior in Washington, D.C. that they started reading this. And so I said, I had that book. It's been sitting on our bookshelf for years. And so I picked it up and started reading along with them and just got, you know, totally blown away by the concept of what church is about or what it should be about the family. What's that? How old were you then? 20. All right, so it's 1976. So you were never a naughty boy. You're always a good boy. Right? Right. Never have a drink of alcohol until 1984. Oh, wow. Really? Okay. I think I had one by mistake where, you know, somebody had a Coke cans on. On some bleachers at a basketball game. And then I had a Coke can next to me, and then I reached over to the other side of me out of habit and. And took a swig, and it was a can of beer. Oh, that I was drinking, and I, you know, I was repulsed because I was expecting Coke and got beer and. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, so this founding minister, Gordon Cosby, had been a, you know, evangelical preacher in Virginia, and then he went to war in World War II, was a chaplain, and. And that experience kind of changed him, you know, talking to people who were about to go out and didn't know whether they'd ever, you know, come back again, you know, in the front and things like that. And so he started thinking about, you know, how, you know, what the. What the message of the shirts is supposed to be. And it wasn't about, you know, afterlife, but it was about community and about, you know, what is life about, you know, you know, not so much the afterlife, but what, you know, this life is and how important it is. And so he came back and. And set up shop in Washington, D.C. and they. They started this church in 1948. And so this, this person that wrote these books was a PR specialist and a writer. And. And so she kind of did the history of this church. And so I've got all the. All those books about that, you know, the new community. And then this one's got. This one's where the eco stuff starts getting, you know, getting planted in my brain or in my heart or, you know, journey inward, journey outward. And so they were very much into, you know, this. The spiritual life and being accountable to one another, but also having a mission and having an outward mission and having some impact somewhere. And so, I mean, you know, out of. Out of that church, they, I mean, they have so many different, you know, divergent ministries. And one of them is called dayspring, which is a. An ecological community that's, you know, they have a few people that live there out. It used to be out in the country, but now it's part of the suburb of, you know, Washington, D.C. area. And I drove out. What's that? So can I just clarify? So the Southern Baptist Church. So it's not all the same. Are they all. They are all a little bit different, depending on. Right. Who leads them? Yeah, yeah. I mean, it used to be, you know, mentioned as one of the mainline denominations. It's nuts. You know, it's not anymore because they become so independent and fundamentalist leaning. When I was in seminary there, there was this big battle about, you know, what, what that seminary was teaching versus what the powers that be that were coming up and taking over things in the Southern Baptist life, you know, thought should be getting taught. And so they started laying down the. The law about what you could and couldn't teach. And, and then, and then. Is it. So is it. Is it a unified church now or is it. Is it sort of splintered? And there's lots of different sort of. Well, most of the professors that I had when I was there, you know, who weren't, you know, of that ilk, pretty much joined a denomination or. I don't know. I don't know if it's considered a domination. It's still kind of considered a splinter. But the Cooperative Baptist are. And they had their own seminary and their own bookstores and their own curriculum now because, you know, they, you know, they just couldn't take it anymore. You know, they're, you know, their. Their sense of mission was getting, you know, interrupted because, you know, there were too many, I don't know what you call it, objections, you know, from, you know, from the far right. And you know, it was just interfering with, you know, doing good work because, you know, they weren't saying the right things or saying things in the right way. And, and you know, and I was in seminary during that time and you know, the, the people that I hung around with and we sat around in the dormitory talking and you know, Reagan was about to get elected and did get elected during, you know, my time in seminary there. So there were lots of discussions about that both, you know, out of class and some classes, like kind of took the whole hour and talked about what was coming up with Reagan. Yeah, so it's so interesting. I mean, churches are always dealing with their own internal sort of forces. Right. So seminary. So tell me a little bit about that. So do you, did you then go on to become a preacher or. I was in, I was there heading into youth ministry, you know, because, you know, I, I had a dynamic, you know, youth ministry experience. And so that's what I wanted to do. And so I was there. And you know, most of the people, most of the people that went into youth ministry took an education track, you know, Master of Religious Education. I, I did the M. Div. Because I wanted more of the theology. Yeah, right. And so that's what I did. And so M. Dev just for people is Masters of Divinity, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you know, and so, you know, my, I, I, I did a, I did a couple of summer stints, which a lot of, you know, going into ministry people did in seminary. They would, and they would even work weekends at the, at these churches while they were in seminary. And so seminary didn't have class on Monday because all these students were, you know, out in the field on the weekend, you know, working at, you know, church, either part time or, you know, full time, that, you know, for the weekend and then come back and then have classes Tuesday, Friday, and then Friday they'd take off and that's what I did. I went to Cincinnati, you know, starting in the fall of 79, and, and, and was at that church, you know, for those next two summers, 1980 and 81. And, and, and you know, during the school year, I was there on the weekends. Yeah. And then my first full time job was in Iowa, in Southeast Iowa at a American Baptist church, which is, you know, that, that was the, the part of the Baptist that split during the Civil War. You know, so the Southern Baptist, you know, were the slave churches and the, and the American Baptists were the Northern churches. And so my first job was a, was a American, but it might have, it Might as well been a Southern Baptist church. It was very conservative. And then, then I became a Lutheran because I went. My next, my next position was at a Lutheran church in Phoenix, Arizona. And then that was the end of my youth ministry days because that, because I had gotten married just before that in 1983. And you know, so spending a lot more time with, with my wife rather than hanging out with the kids, which I did as a single person, a lot more. They were, they were sort of my, my group. And then that wasn't true anymore. And so I, you know, and then I, I had become, started to become interested in, in media and technology communications. Yeah. And so my aim was to get into that in the church related communications area. Yeah. And you had various levels of success there, right? Yeah, yeah. After that, Phoenix, Arizona youth ministry experience, we moved back to Cincinnati. I started selling electronics. And then eventually after 10, you know, almost 10 years. Well, it wasn't 10 years of that, but from. We, we moved back to Cincinnati in 85 was about, we're about to have our first child, you know, who's now 30 something. And, and I was in a bookstore, a Baptist bookstore, looking at books and. No, it was a Cokesbury bookstore actually. That's the United Methodist. We could have a whole discussion just about American religions. Right? Yeah. I saw a book by a guy who had written a bunch of youth ministry resources that I had used. And I'd actually talked to this guy a couple of times, you know, to ask him, you know, what else he saw in, in these areas, because he had written and done a lot of youth resources on using the media for ministry and discussing music and things like that. And so I picked up his book and looked at the back to see what he's up to now. And he was in Dayton, Ohio, which is just up, you know, 40 miles up the road, and starting this religious communications program at the seminary. They were the first seminary to have a communications degree. And it was, you know, mainly centered around media type things, you know, sort of, sort of a media awareness communications. And so I ended up entering that program in late 89, just, just after my son was born. In fact, we took him when we visited to check out a couple of classes. We took him with us that he was in his, in his little rocker and he was sitting there on, on the, on the, on my desk, you know, sitting in class. But. And so that was 1990 and 91. So that was 10 years after my M. Div. I got my, what we call the mark degree, which is a master's of arts religious communication. And what also was happening during that time was the, the Internet was starting up and computers were starting to get sold personal computers. And so I, you know, as a, as a technology nerd at the time, or still am, you know, that became integrated into all of this and I got put in charge of, you know, getting things organized in the, in the video, audio and video studio at this, at the seminary. And so they had all this technology and I got involved in it and, and, and got things hooked up correctly and, and you know, got some things upgraded and you know, that had an impact on what I did later because I, you know, used some of the same companies technology, you know, to start doing my own shows. And this was like 2002. So I suppose, I suppose we can blame you for the beginning of the religious influencer culture then. I don't, I don't know about that, but yeah, I mean, and so just a few years after that, after I got that degree, I was, I, you know, just held some part time jobs and, and one of them was selling computers because that was starting up as I mentioned. And then, you know, so I was finished with that program in 91. In 1997, I moved to Nashville to work for the United Methodist Publishing House. My, my parents, you know, also lived there. So it wasn't an unfamiliar territory. I'd visited Nashville a lot and, and, and then in my, and my two brothers lived in Nashville as well. So ever, you know, the whole family was there and you know, so it was an easy move for me. Not, you know, not so much for my wife but you know, she was excited about it too and you know, bought our first house and. So. United, United Methods Publishing House. Five and a half years. United Methodist Communications. Five and a half years. There was like six months or about a year in between where I went from one to the other. And then so after that I was mainly a sort of a free agent in web development stuff and did some work for the, for, for the publishing house after. I mean not the publishing house but the communications program because they all, they always had web projects that needed extra hands on and I had worked on some of those and, and even built some of those. So you know, they, you know, they contracted with me, you know, on several occasions in that. But during that time the Occupy Wall street movement started and so me and my media and religious communications sort of started covering that, you know, in my, in my blogging and my online, you know, social media was just getting started then. Yeah, I think I started My. I started my, you know, doing that full force in like, 2009. I. I had joined Facebook and, And. And Google and, you know, some of the other ones in 2007 when they began. But then in 2009, when I was sort of on my way out from the. From the communications job, I started diving in headlong to. Into social media. And so I was used to writing, and I always been into writing. You know, that church that I mentioned way back, you know, you know, in 76, I started a journal then. So I started, you know, writing about what I was thinking about. Did that for like seven years and have like, almost 3,000 pages of written journal pages that I, you know, have stashed away. You have to publish that as a book one day, right? Yeah, I could. And, you know, and then, you know, my writing kind of got funneled, you know, the energy got funneled into the social media, and it was sort of a journalizing or, or publicizing of my journals. I became, you know, a little bit less introspective and, And. And more, you know, kind of writing for an audience kind of a thing, explain things to people instead of to myself. I gotta tell you, Dale, it's fascinating because you kind of like, at the front, you had a front seat to the technology revolution while also having a front seat to the communication revolution, but from a religious perspective, which is possibly one of the most unique career trajectories I've actually come across. So I think. Yeah, I don't think I've ever met anybody like you. So our theme today is eco theology. So let's get stuck into it. So I suppose the best place to start is what is it and why. Why is it so important? Well, you know, theology is, you know, God talk, you know, the, the, you know, two pieces of that word, you know, theos and logos and. Yeah, ecology, you know, is. Is eco, you know, is ecosystem talk. And, and so, you know, eco theology is. Is, you know, talking about the ecosystem, you know, you know, from a perspective of, you know, of. Of what God might think or, or what the purpose of it is. You know, I've come to. To a concept of God that is less of a anthropomorphization. I got that word out without much stumbling, you know, you know, thinking of thinking about God as, you know, as like some other form of human, when it's, you know, more complicated than that. And so, you know, the eco part of eco theology causes you to talk about God differently because you realize the, the intricate, you know, the interrelationship of everything. When you become an eco theologian and, you know, you're influenced by, you know, Genesis and the human condition and, you know, what's it all about. And, and, and so I think, you know, in, in modern times, when we have more science, you know, to instruct us about how things came about or how things might have come about or, you know, what it looks like, you know, to be the, the answer to the question of how things came about. You know, you have the, you know, beginnings in the Big bang and, you know, and how things formed and all the elements and, and, you know, recently I've, I've started reading this guy named Thomas Barry who's sort of a eco theological mentor for a lot of the people that I've, you know, have sort of mentored me and, you know, for the past 11 years as I've, you know, you know, taken a dive, you know, pretty much headlong in, into this, you know, I mentioned, you know, 11 years because that was when I read it's Naomi Klein book. This Changes Everything. Capitalism versus the climate. She's not in the, she's not a. Theologian, but it, it, you know, really shaped, you know, where my theology started heading, you know, since 2014. This was like September, October 2014, I, I bought it as a Kindle book. But then somewhere along the line, I had signed up on the Simon and Schuster site for, you know, for, for a contest for a free copy. And so, you know, like, you know, sometimes, you know, like a month after I was into the book, you know, reading it on, you know, reading it on a Kindle, you know, this book shows up in my, in my mailbox, a little letter from Simon and Schuster saying, congratulations on this. Nice. So what, what was it, what was it about that book that sort of. I love, I love a book that knocks your socks off. What was it about that one? I think. I mean, you know, she tells a lot of stories and she tells a lot of stories about what she calls Blockadia, which is. Most of them involve indigenous communities protesting the incursion of extractive industries. And so, you know, she's in Canada and, and you know, so there was, you know, the, the tar sands and Alberta and you know, you know, all the, you know, and, you know, there was a big fire, I think, near Alberta and, and just a lot of stories like that, you know, not only in Canada but, you know, around the world and, and basic. And she, she, her, her husband is a video producer. And so they did a, a video version of, of the book. And it mostly chronicled a lot of those Blockadia stories. So I, and then, you know, and she definitely described along with that the, you know, the sense of urgency that, you know, that we're now seeing because of, you know, what's happening scientifically, ecologically, you know, with the earth. And so, and so she started out, you know, talking about, you know, she just had a, you know, her first child and, you know, and, and, and she was, you know, reflecting on, you know, what all this means for, you know, what he's going to experience 20 years down the road. And, you know, and, and that had an impact. And, and, and so, you know, the, the, the fact that she, she sort of pushed me through that door of, of waking up to the urgency of the, of the climate crisis. I immediately went to some theological people that I had been reading that, that were, that had mentioned it, but I didn't pay all that much attention to it. I just said, oh, that, that's an interesting angle. And, you know, and I had always been a little bit interested in that, but, you know, nothing earth shattering, you know, unintended. And so Brian McLaren was one, one, you know, progressive theological person who had written things that I had been reading over the years for the past, you know, 20 years before that. And oddly enough, you know, Naomi Klein's book was this changes everything. Brian McLaren had a book called Everything Must Change, and one of the chapters in it was the Ecological Situation. And so, you know, he always did a good bibliography of sources, you know, for what, you know, what he had written about. And so I went and, and found a bunch of the books that he had had in his bibliography. Also ran across Michael Dowd, who was doing a series of 100 interviews with people all across the spectrum that had to do with ecological philosophy and in eco theology and ecological economics and cosmological philosophy. And, you know, and, and Thomas Berry was, was somebody who was a mentor for Michael Dowd. Michael Dowd. Also one of the people he interviewed was Drew Dallinger, who, you know, started following or immediately started following on social media. And he was also an Occupy Wall street activists, which, you know, I've gotten. I think I failed to mention that when I was talking about my. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, yeah, prior to getting my present domain, which is eco ecclesia.org I had a domain called occupytheology.org and all media and my writing was involved in, in ecological justice, in economical justice issues. So, you know, I'd already been interested in that mainly because of Naomi Klein. She had written a book prior to this, this changes everything. Called the Shock Doctrine, which was about how, how countries use crises to, to, to do radically oppressive economic things. Yeah. Pretty apparent right now, right? Yeah, yeah. And one of the stories that, you know, that I think was. One of the first ones in the, in that book was Katrina. And you know, what they did or you know, and, or attempted to do and some, in some ways succeeded in, you know, giving, you know, more entertainment built and, and they were, they were like tsunami struck areas in Asia that after the tsunami happened, you know, they, you know, all of a sudden all these beaches were fishing had been going on, you know, and was the sustenance for a lot of, you know, people indigenous to the area. They were banned from, you know, the beachfront there. And, and, and what happened was that, you know, luxury hotels went up, you know, so they took that catastrophe and you know, and, and out of the sense of public safety, you know, kept people from the area and you know, for the purposes of developing it, you know, for you know, beachfront vacation stuff. Yeah, well, they're worried about that. No, I. After the fires. Right. Yeah. La. That you look at who's buying the land and what they're planning to do with it. So. Yeah, every time there's a disaster. Right. Yeah, yeah. So I, I would, I've gotten into that and you know, and there's, and there's scores of areas to, you know, to like, you know, to go out in all different directions with, you know, from eco theology because, you know, I kind of came in from economics and then, you know, and then I go back out to spirituality because, you know, Thomas Berry and Leonardo Boff, who wrote a book called Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor, which I just finished before started reading this Thomas Berry book, which is called the Dream of the Earth. Both, both of those guys, you know, both and Barry are. Boffin. Barry are, are very scientific in their writing as well. You know, both more so. And I, and I was, you know, intrigued and fascinated with, you know, how they described it and, and something I'll get into later when you talk about the, you know, the hope of eco theology. But, but the, the Boff talks about the energies of the cosmos, you know, that, you know, part of that is, is, is all of the elements you know, converging over, you know, millions and billions of years to get to the place where humans evolved. And you know, humans are, you know, consist of, you know, the human body consists of all those elements, but it's not just the physical elements. There's this spiritual element and, and, and you know, both Boff and Barry talk about the evolution of the, of the human mind. And not just the human mind, but, you know, the human mind is sort of of, you know, the cosmos stuff. Yeah. And so to be cut, you know, to go back in and recover a earth centered consciousness or spirituality is sort of a natural thing that this sort of, it's sort of a rediscovering of things that are, you know, have been submerged by Western civilization. And that's, that's one of the, one of the books that I pulled out that Matthew Fox, he was one of the, like a c. What I call a seed planter in my ecological journey because, you know, he, I have a, probably a dozen of his books from, and they were all from the 1990s, which was prior to this ecological emphasis that I have now. But reading him made, you know, you know, opened up that vista a little bit so that I, you know, part of that, part of that energy I gained from that and, and the realization that, you know, that there were earth energies and earth awareness that I kind of need to give more space to, you know, you know, to incorporate that into who I am, you know, that kind of burst forth, you know, after I, you know, read the Naomi Klein book and started reading, you know, related books. And a lot of those people were, you know, people that were interviewed in a Michael dowd series of 100 interviews because, you know, that's, you know, that's typical of the poly crisis, you know, which is what a lot of people call the climate crisis. Poly crisis because, you know, it's, it's economic, it's agricultural, it's spiritual, it's, it's. You know, just technological, it's. Yeah. Societal, mental health, it's everything. Right? Yes. So one of the things that I was looking at with eco theology is it's. A lot of the theologists are really spending a lot of time looking at the words in the Bible because how it's been interpreted in the past as, you know, so a word like dominion he's always brought up. Right. And the interpretation is that we have dominion, which means we're superior. And so a lot of the, the theologians are looking at the words and, and they're looking at them with fresh eyes, with, with the eco lens over it. Can you talk a little bit more about that? Because that sounds like it's a bit of a, an interesting sort of challenge that they're facing trying to almost not reinterpret the Bible, but just look at it and maybe question Whether or not they got that bit right. Which. Yeah, I like doing that. Yeah. The dominion word is a, is a really good example because, you know, like you said, you know, it, you know, the first off or, you know, first glance. It's, it's, you know, power over and, and taking advantage of and, and you know, you know, having a. Oh, one of those words that slips in my mind at the moment, you know, where you use something because of what it can do for you rather than its intrinsic value. And so, you know, technological society, you know, does that to, you know, to, you know, to the Earth. And that's. And a lot of people, you know, eco philosophers blame and, and, you know, this is partially true. They, you know, they blame Christianity and, and, and its theology for that type, type of approach toward the Earth. In fact, there was a guy, can't think of his first name right now, but his last name is White, and, and he wrote this article about the, the, the ecolog or the theological roots of the, of the ecological crisis. Yeah, yeah, there's a really good white paper on it. I read it a little while ago. It's amazing. Yeah. Yeah, but it's also, it's also goes back to colonial times, right? Yeah, yeah, it's really an interesting point of view. Yeah. And, and so the counter to that, you know, like, you know, for the dominion idea is to look at the, the purpose, you know, the, the, the positive purpose of, of having a dominion or a kingdom or whatever is to take care of your subjects. You know, it's sort of, you know, sort of like a, you know, a good society or a common good society. And, and the, and the king looks after that. And you know, I mean, after all that was the, you know, the original intent and purpose of, you know, Israel, you know, asking for a king because, you know, they saw how, you know, other kingdoms or countries, you know, you know, got organized and got wealthy because they had a king. And you know, it turns out, you know, in a lot of those cases the king went out and conquered other places and you know, to add to the, you know, those economies. Well, that's kind of what, you know, Western Christianity, you know, did as well. You know, they, instead of mimicking the taking care of part, they, they mimic the taking over part and they went out and, you know, conquered and did that, you know, not only to other countries but, you know, to, you know, ecological habitats, not, you know, not having any forethought about any consequences of that because one, they didn't, you know, they didn't have the science telling them that this is what they're doing. Yeah. And, you know, they didn't have the reflection afterwards. And when. When consequences started happening because of that to. To make the connection, because after all, they're just building a. You know, they're building a kingdom, aren't they? Yeah, exactly. But there's no excuse for that now. Right. And yet it continues. Right? No excuse. You know, you know, I often talk about the. You know, I sort of date from 1988 and in Hanson, telling, you know, basically telling the world because he got before Congress, because prior to that, scientists had been telling the U.S. government, you know, and probably in other countries, too, scientists have been telling the government, you know, we better start thinking about this for the future or. Or even now starting to do things now. And the governments weren't listening and Henson had had enough. And. And so he, you know, you know, basically went on television because, you know, C span and things like that were. Yeah. Already in play. And. And so he knew that more people would see it. And, you know, and more people did. And journalists started taking up the. The matter. And, you know, Bill McKibben's the first person I think of when I think of journalists, you know, taking up the topic and the. And the issues and the. And the cause. And, you know, pretty much from 1988 on, that's when Bill McKinnon started writing all of his stuff. And Margaret Thatcher, I mean, she, she. She was outspoken. You know, so we did have leaders around the world, but, yeah, it's a. And he. And yet here we are using. Using more fossil fuels than we ever had. You know, people, you know, buy more clothes than they've ever bought. That last less time than they ever have, and they throw them out and they end up and landfill somewhere on the other side of the world, and we just continue to consume. It's like. It's this rabidness. It's. It. It constantly amazes me, you know, at some point we've got to look around and go, wait a minute, this isn't. This isn't good for any of us. You know, but I don't know. I've been waiting for that time for a long time. And I know you have, too. Yeah. But I think. I think religion is going to be a big part of. Big part of the answer. And we can see what the Pope's doing. Yeah. But. So from your perspective, when it comes to the Christian community, especially in the U.S. what do you think of the whole. What's holding the. What are the obstacles that are holding it back. You know, is eco theology becoming central to the doctrine or is it still just a few people off in the, in the corners of the church doing it? Because I know, I know the Pope's putting it at the center of the Catholic Church and influencing other religious groups around the world. So what are you saying where you are? Yeah, well, I did my shelf picking thing and, and I've got one, you know, one that represents, you know, the, the Catholic Church, you know, for our common home. And, and so, you know, this isn't laudato si itself, but it's process relational responses to laudato si, which this was a book written or collected together from people who were at this conference. That was one of the first major things that I did in terms of learning this was, I don't can see it seizing an alternative toward an ecological civilization. That was 2015. You know, reason I went there was again because, you know, Michael Dowd did those interviews and like three or four people that he interviewed there were talking about this. Brian McLaren was, you know, the theology person that I had been reading that I mentioned earlier. He was one of Michael Dowd's interviews, Philip Clayton, who's a professor of ecology and process theology at, at Claremont School of Theology, which is United Methodist Seminary. And so this was in, at Pomona College, which is in Claremont, California. And it's the last time I flown, you know, I investigated driving so I wouldn't be flying. But then, you know, the, the amount of time it took and just working out the logistics of where to stay, it turned, you know, and, you know, I checked about the, the, the, you know, the size of the, of the flights, you know, where, you know, you know, to see that there was, you know, a lot of people on the flights. And so I felt better. That made me feel better about the carbon footprint or anyone. So, you know, you're thinking about it. Most people don't even think about it still. So. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, and, and so, you know, most of everybody that I had been reading was there and so video stuff with me and let's see here, what did I do with it? Talking about the eco theology stuff and Faith Earth Honoring Faith by Larry Rasmussen. Yeah. And I, I like quoted, you know, on my social media and this was back in 2014 and 15, you know, just for, for several days, probably several weeks, because I was reading and I'd stop and say, oh, you know, that's great. And I, you know, post a quote and, and you know, I bought the Hardback, you know, book. And then I said, well, you know, I'll buy the Kindle too, because that'll make it easier to, you know, to copy and paste. And when you, when you copy from the Kindle, it automatically puts the reference there at the end for you. So there you go. There's a hot tip. Yeah. Yeah. So in Process Theology, you know, which is, you know, the subtitle of this book for our Common home Process Relational responses to love. O.C. so La Doc had just, you know, come out the year before this conference in 2014. The conference was in 2015. And so they asked everybody that, you know, all the main, all the main presenters to write something about, about laudato si in there. And so this book came out shortly afterwards. Introduction by Bill McKibben. He was one of the, the keynote speakers at the, at this conference. And Wes Jackson and, and Vandiver Shiva, you know, just, I mean, and, and then, and then oftener, this book, Earth Honoring Faith, and I, I often refer to that as like, you know, it ought to be the, the textbook for a course in eco theology. At seminaries. Everyone, you know, but, you know, you, you don't see it. And there's only like a handful of seminaries in the entire country that have eco theology programs at all, or even eco theology courses. So I mean, that's a bit of an irresponsibility, right? From a, from a religious institution perspective. Right. So. And then we know that in the US there's the far right, the Christian nationalists, we got Trump, you know, climate con, you know, all that sort of stuff. So, so is that the obstacle? This, there's this kind of loyalty within the faith towards denial because it links to, I don't know, some political belief. What is it? What. But it, it. I mean, you guys are seeing firsthand. Yeah, I mean, it's exactly that. I mean, you know, it's, it's, it, it's subservience to the political ideology first, and that results in the, in the denial because, you know, priority, you know, prior to the climate crisis, you know, you know, prior to 1990, you had re. You know, like lots of Republicans that were very, you know, ecologically oriented and, and those people, you know, just started getting, you know, primaried. You know, basically, Bob Inglis is, you know, is a South Carolina. I forget whether he's a Rep or senator, but he, he lost his seat because he had been talking about ecological issues. And then when the Republican Party started, you know, going the opposite way, you know, he, he lost his seat, because that's not that. That's not part of the dogma of the Republican Party anymore. And so it's still. You're not seeing any shift at all, like, as the event. As the extreme weather events get worse. And nothing of the significance that it needs to be. I mean. Yeah, right. It's just, you know, here and there, which is, you know, not going to cut it. Yeah. Is it time for you to go back into the ministry and become an eco theologian? Well, I kind of think I, you know, I kind of think that's what I've been doing. You know, social media has afforded me the. No, I mean, I mean, you're on stage with all those guys and girls that you admire. I think is the time stopping the student and be at the front. Yeah, I get. I guess the church structure needs to change, you know, to, To. To. To create a spot for that. Yeah, right. Because there's not any. I mean, for, you know, you know, for one thing, you know, the churches have always been really bad at making theological and spiritual resources available. I mean, hardly any churches have anything like a library. I mean, and the ones that do, you know, it's like a. It's almost like a closet compared to the rest of the facility of the church. Oh, the library, it's over here. You go over there and it's like a, you know, little room that's, you know, that. That, you know, barely a dozen people can fit into, and you've got, you know, you know, like five bookshelves of things, and it's usually just books that the pastors mentioned in his sermons, you know. Yeah, yeah. That's why. That's why I have to go to the Vanderbilt Divinity School Library to get anything of. Of any depth in eco theology or anything in eco theology. Yeah. Well, it looks like you've got your own personal library there. All right. So it's. It's not really going anywhere, and it's probably going in the wrong direction, you know, basically since the 80s. Right. That's what you're saying. So. But, but, but we can't give up. Right. You and I are determined never to give up. We're fighting in our own way with our own voices. Um, where do you. Where do you. Where do you get your hope from? Well, you know, part of that is, you know, in. In some of the stirrings or the beginnings, you know, like laudato si. From, you know, from the. From the Catholic Church. The. There's, you know, eco Reformation, you know, from the. From the Protestant side and you know, this book was done by, you know, in 2017 by a bunch of Lutherans. In 2017 was the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. Yeah, right. October, you know, something. So they were writing with that in mind. And. And so, you know, there's probably 95 theses, you know, which is what Martin Luther nailed on the door of the Wittenberg Church to you know, to basically, you know, kick off the Protestant Reformation. He wasn't thinking of a Protestant Reformation, but that's what it became, you know, and it was, you know, led by, you know, you know, his theological emphases. So what is it? You know, I mean, he. He was. His 95 theses were basically talking about what he thought was missing from. From, you know, the, The. The. The. The church that be, you know, the, The Catholic powers that be. And, and so what would be the 95 ecological, eco theology, you know, theses that should be nailed up on. Yeah, right. What. What church. What church would represent, you know, you know, the church in America? I don't know. But, you know, there. There's probably several that could use, you know, a, you know, hey, you know, these 95 things are important. Probably, you know, narrow it down to 10. But all of those, you know, just like, you know, there's a poly crisis, you know, it just branches out naturally. Well, maybe you could lead that initiative then kind of. We need. We need to do something, right, because the, the, you know, we've got COP30 going on this week. Americans not there. You know, I, I think through religion and through the institutions of religion, we can make the most impact. You see, with, you know, Pope Leo, there's 1.3, 1.4 billion Catholics, and he's. He's brought in, you know, he's done. I don't know what he calls the rituals with the Muslim community, Muslim leaders. You know, I'm. I'm out in Asia where there's Hindu, there's Druze, there's Buddha, Buddhism. I mean, there's so many different faiths in the world, right, and coming together. And I'll bring this up equally. Let me. My mouse isn't working. So you don't feel like you're in the spotlight all the time. But, you know, there's. There's. I mean, you know, I think 75 of the world's population follows a religion of some description. So if we could get the message through. I've spoken to some of the guys that we. We've met in Uganda who work in refugee camps, and one. One of the guys I spoke to they, he basically across Uganda through the churches, through the mosque, through the temples. They're getting the message out there. They're trying to turn the, the gardens and the land around the churches, temples and mosques into, into, into food gardens, the churches, the faith zone, an extraordinary amount of land. But if it's just pretty gardens, that's not really serving any purpose. Right. But I, but I do think, you know, 75% of the world's population follows a religion of some description. That's the entry point. But, but it sounds like in America it's, it's just, it's just not there, you know. So how do you deal with that? Basically, you know, trying to, you know, to just, you know, put forth an alternative, I guess and say, you know, and you know, I'm always saying some form of no, that's not it. No. I mean, you know, you know, since I was in seminary and you know, and, and the, the guy that came in that took over the, the, the presidency of the seminary that I was at, you know, just a, he's somebody that makes me roll my eyes, you know, constantly and, and, and, and he was doing that for, you know, from the get go and you know, saying Southern Baptist or this or something and. No, no, it's just, you know, so what's that been? You know, that's 40, 45 years, you know, 44 years, you know, since I graduated from there. So I'm kind of, I'm kind of used to the, you know, rolling the eyes and being embarrassed by, you know, you know, and with, you know, MAGA Christians, it's just, you know, out the window. Oh yeah, it's, it's, it's the, it's just the hypocrisy, right? The, the cruelty, the, you know, as, as someone sitting outside of America looking at what's going on. It's, you know, people who are fighting for, to try and get rid of a woman's right to have an abortion, but then they don't take care of the children that are born. You know, the, just the way if you're, if you're not white, basically how you're being treated on the streets of your, of your country at the moment. It's just, you know, for a Christian nation, it's, it's pretty damning for, for those of us outside watching it. You know, I was reading one of the long reads about the, the, the Venezuelan guys that were put in the prison. In which country was it again? Ecuador. Ecuador. You know, that horrible prison. I mean, just it's just barbaric. Those people being killed on those boats off Venezuela. It's like it's, that's not Christianity. You know, I, I walked away from, from the church, but I understood the concept of what it was supposed to mean. So it must be, it must be challenging to be part of an institution for so long that still has a lot of disappointment, I think, you know. The, the eco theology track, I guess for lack of a better term is, is it, it's helpful in that it enables people outside the faith to maybe, you know, see an avenue for becoming interested in, in some, as, you know, in some angle of faith because there's that common ground of the ecological concern, you know, crisis club, you know, that that's, that's how I fit in there is that, you know, and, and that's why I got accepted there is because I talked about, you know, the, you know, the climate crisis and coming at it as a person of faith. And so, you know, that in itself helps to dispel, you know, the, you know, the maga. Christian right, climate denying aspect of it, you know, that it's not, you know, entirely populated by, you know, brain dead, you know, brainwashed, you know, ideologically centered narcissistic people. Yeah, unfortunately. So for the, for the people who are in the Christian community in the United States, whether they're Baptist or Methodist or Lutheran or whatever else, because I know there's a lot more than that. What, what would you encourage them to do right now? The ones who know that there's a problem and, and, and they want to see their churches sort of step into this moment and change directions from where they're currently going. What, what's your message to them? I guess it would, I mean, you know, at, at its most basic, just start talking about it, you know, first, you know, I mean, that's what people expect, you know, you know, it's, is to make you aware, you know, it used to be the, the, the church's job to inform people, you know, before, before there was mass media. That was the media, you know, the, the priest, you know, was, that was the conveyor of information about the world. Yeah. You know, if, if we were in, you know, still in that situation, you know, we, we'd be in, you know, probably dire trouble because, you know, if free still, you know, and, and preachers and priests still took the track of, of, of of what so much of, you know, Christianity has taken, which is, you know, to appropriate culture and to make people feel good about living in it, you know, rather Than, you know, be prophetic, you know, which should be a key part of it, you know, the, the prophetic aspect, you, Prophetic imagination. I failed to mention that during this whole thing that, that prophetic imagination is what we need to see through what, what, what's referred to in the Matrix as the thing that's been pulled over your eyes to blind you to the tr. Truth. You know, that's, that's what the Matrix is. And you know, the church isn't, isn't being prophetic in that way. It's not, it's not enabling people to see through that and, or even to realize that there is, you know, something blinding them to the truth. They're just soaking it in. Yeah. Oh, I like that. Oh, I can't believe how quickly this time it's gone. It's been really. It's been really lovely to talk to you but I figure we'll let everyone go. But thanks for spending the time with me. I've been. Every time you listen, every time you speak, I'm always, I'm always listening in. And I believe that religion is a central pillar in the fight. And one of the problems we've got, of course, is there's a, an extreme element. But I think if we can bring the rest of the world together through religion. But I do fear the extremists, not just in the US there's more, there's extremism happening around the world. But just really appreciate your insights and thanks for joining me. Yeah, well, thank you for asking me. And you're going to go and spend time with your grandkids now, right? Oh, yeah, always. All right, thanks. I'll see you soon. All right. Uncommon courage should be everywhere Uncommon courage. Fair. Let's talk about. Let's talk about all the hard things all the hard things let's start to say all of the stuff that we all think Uncommon courage Should be everywhere should be everywhere Uncommon courage Uncommon courage.