The Adventures of Mr. Chris

Religion & Ecology

This page contains resources related to the intersections of religion and ecology, one of my research and teaching interests. The larger intellectual project I am interested in is how religious worldviews–by which I mean diverse understandings of spirituality, both institutional and informal–shape the way we view environmental issues and determine our environmental politics. This includes: Creation Care movement coming out of the green Evangelical groups; Dominion Mandate anti-environmentalist Evangelical fundamentalists; Animist and indigenous stewardship and management linked to sacred lands; Wiccan and pagan “dark green” environmentalism and direct action politics; Ecological and spiritual themes within Buddhism, Islam, Taoism, Shinto, Hinduism, Judaism, Bönpo, Sikhism and other faith traditions. There is really no part of the religious or “spiritual” matrix that doesn’t intersect with ecological questions.

My early research focused on conservative Christianity and animism as influences on environmental politics, but my more recent work has focused on the idea of Earthbound cosmopolitics, which I argue are a form of new Earth-centered practices emerging in response to the Anthropocene. But more generally I find the intersections of religion and ecology fascinating. With that in mind, below are some resources I have collected in my various studies, including some of my own work in this area.

 

PERSONAL WORK:

  • This is a talk I gave at the fall 2014 American Academy of Religion (AAR) conference on Bruno Latour, Gaian Animism and the Anthropocene. This is part of a longer chapter for my PhD dissertation that I am currently writing, and this talk is part of my work looking at the 2013 Gifford Lectures by Latour and his idea of the people of Gaia or Earthbound people, and its connection to Gaian political movements and the Anthropocene. Once I do some more work I may post a draft copy of that paper here as well.

 

 

  • This is a talk I gave in the fall of 2013 at the American Academy of Religion (AAR) conference on Astrobiology and Young Earth Creationism. You can also download a copy of the paper that this talk is based on here: [PDF]. This was part of my more recent work looking at a specific area of science and how Creationist discourses were/are influencing them. Although this was written more for a science audience, it gives a bit more of a flavor for what kind of work I am doing.

 

 

 

Religion and Ecology Resources

There is a considerable body of research now available for those interested in how religious beliefs and ecology connect and influence each other. These studies look at any number of factors, ranging from the individual to the international, from community organizations to multinational corporations, and from traditional Abrahamic religions to animist and indigenous values and worldviews. And these studies cover all parts of the world and all faith traditions, although there has been more work done on Christianity and the environment due to the the predominance of Euro-American academics and the particularities of both religious studies and ecological studies. Below are just a few possible resources for those wanting to learn more.

 

ONLINE RESOURCES:

A few good academic journal resources are listed below, which serve as centers for scholarship and discussions of these issues for both academic and popular audiences. If you are interested in learning more about this field or study, these are a must visit.

There are also a few popular magazine that often cover the intersections of religion and ecology, listed below:

 

BOOKS:

There are literally hundreds, perhaps even into the thousands now, of books devoted to religion and ecology in some form, even if they do not use that exact language. Here are a few key books I would recommend as places to start.

  • The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Ecology. Edited by Roger Gottlieb.
  • The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature. Edited by Bron Taylor.
  • Grounding Religion: A Field Guide to the Study of Religion and Ecology. Whitney A. Bauman, Richard Bohannon II, Kevin O’Brien (eds).
  • Ecology and Religion. Paul Grim and Mary Evelyn Tucker.
  • This Sacred Earth: Religion, Nature, Environment. Roger Gottlieb.
  • Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future. Bron Taylor.
  • Animism: Respecting the Living World. Graham Harvey.
  • Ecospirit. Edited by Kearns and Keller.
  • Indigenous Traditions and Ecology. Edited by John Grim.
  • Nature Religion in America. Katherine Albanese.
  • Sacred Ecology. Fikret Berkes.
  • Care for Creation: A Franciscan Spirituality of the Earth. Edited by Delio, Warner and Wood.
  • Worldviews, Religion and the Environment: A Global Anthology. Edited by Foltz.
  • Subversive Spiritualities: How Rituals Enact the World. Frederique Apffel-Marglin.
  • God is Green: Ecology for Christians. Ian Brodley.
  • A Climate for Change: Global Warming Facts for Faith-Based Decisions. Hayhoe and Farley.
  • Islam and Ecology: A Bestowed Trust. Edited by Foltz, Denny, Baharuddin and Afrasiabi.
  • Green Deen: What Islam Teaches about Protecting the Planet. Abdul-Matin and Ellison.
  • Ecology and the Jewish Spirit. Ellen Bernstein.
  • Judaism and Ecology: Created World and Revealed Word. Edited by Tirosh-Samuelson, Blanchard, Diamond and Eisenberg.
  • Earth’s Insights: A Multicultural Survey of Ecological Ethics from the Mediterranean Basin to the Australian Outback. Callicott and Hayden.