The Trumpeter - Journal of Ecosophy (Athabasca University)
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“It Cannot Be Emphasized Enough How Everything Is Interconnected”: Ecological Wisdom, Cross-Cultural Insight, and Pope Francis’ Social Teaching
Get PDFWhen understood as anthropogenic phenomena, contemporary social and ecological crises can be framed as moral issues, arising from human action and neglect of duties to marginalized human and ecological neighbours. In so much as the roots of these problematic outcomes lie in worldview, ecological wisdom can help in fostering spaces for integrated ethical responses to associated challenges like global climate change, social injustice, and ecological delegation. The present article highlights select instances of thinkers who express convergences between social and ecological concern by exploring cross-cultural perspectives on ecological wisdom. Then, with the aid of a green theo-ecoethical viewpoint informed by those perspectives, it maps relevant teachings of Pope Francis that are expressed in two of his most important exercises of his magisterial office: Evangelii Gaudium and Laudato Si’. As brought into view through dialogue with contemporary articulations of ecological wisdom, inclusive of overlapping Indigenous and academic insights, this approach helps discern a noteworthy measure of rhetorical support for socio-ecological flourishing found in the teaching of Pope Francis
Techno-Science, Integral Thought, and the Reality of Limits in Laudato Si’
Get PDF"Reality" is a term that appears dozens of times in Pope Francis’s Laudato Si’. The term is not directly defined, but appears to signal for Francis a mysterious, relational, created order that imposes limits on humans while also evoking positive feelings like wonder and peace. Francis contrasts this vision of reality with perspectives on the world that are human-centered, fragmented, or reductionist. In this way, his account of reality grounds his sharp critique of narrow, techno-scientific perspectives on life and the world that entail a will to mastery and control. Francis’s critique of reductive, fragmentary perspectives is also connected to his concern with a category of humans and nonhuman others whom Francis designates “the excluded” in Laudato Si’. Distorted views of reality perpetuate neglect of these excluded others and prevent us from grasping the integral functioning of human, ecological, and social realms. I conclude by contrasting Francis’s version of integral ecology with other forms of integral thought that express naïve enthusiasm for technology, and suggest a denial of human and natural limits
Proposing an Examen for Living the Ecology of Daily Life and Building a Culture of Care
Get PDFThis article examines a relatively unexplored aspect of integral ecology in Laudato Si’ called “the ecology of daily life” and considers how living a healthy ecology of daily life relates to the unique vocation of humans to care for creation. Specifically, what does the Pope intend by “the ecology of daily life”? What are some obstacles to living it? How can living the ecology of daily life help build a culture of care? Based upon the principles articulated in the encyclical, the article proposes an examen for assessing progress in living the ecology of daily life. This examen is applied to two case studies in order to discern a fruitful practice of the ecology of daily life. The case studies represent environmental situations that, while affected by larger scale industrial/commercial processes, are primarily driven by micro-scale decision-making and small daily actions of individuals and local communities. The first case study focuses on endocrine disrupting chemicals as an example of a polluted ecology of daily life, and the second highlights a zero waste initiative as an exemplar of an integral ecology of daily life. The article concludes with comments on lessons learned from the exercise of applying the examen to two concrete situations. This approach can help individuals and communities discern how to build a culture of care based upon the principles of the ecology of daily life as they are presented in Laudato Si’
Walking With Elephants: A Case for Trans-Species Ethnography
Get PDFThis paper argues for the development of new methodologies for studying animals and human-animal relationships that take qualitative and hermeneutic considerations into account. Drawing on the traditions of anthropology, depth psychology, and somatic studies, the paper advocates for the use of a trans-species ethnography that situates the researcher as a participant-observer in the field, in relationship with the subjects of study. This theoretical framework is illustrated by case study in the form of the author’s fieldwork on human-elephant communication at an elephant sanctuary in Cambodia
Obscured by Cloud: Educating in the Anthropocene
Get PDFWe are caught just now between acting in the face of an overwhelming environmental collapse, and trying to understand where to begin. How do we educate for this new reality? What are the stories that need telling, now? The answer, of course, isn't found in technological marvels or bio-engineering. To know the world, this place - the northeast Avalon Peninsula, attached to Newfoundland proper by a narrow isthmus - we have to be in it. We’ll take the sleet and the rain, the howling winds and the sudden downpours. We’ll take the swirl of May fogs, with the mercury struggling to break five degrees Celsius, that last for days like weeks. We need the mundane. The mundane defines us. It brings people together. It grounds us in stories that speak back years and generations, all rooted here
Caring for the Domus: On the Evolution of Ecopoetics in the West
Get PDFThis intimate non-fiction essay traces a lineage of Western ecopoetics and ecological thought to its ancient Roman origins by calling upon David Ferry’s inspired translations of Horace’s Odes, and reading them in light of the philosophical imperatives described by David Orr, Wendell Berry, and other important thinkers, in order to formulate an understanding of how the ongoing environmental crisis is ultimately a crisis of the human spirit. Through creating a linguistic mosaic of Horace’s didactic wisdom enmeshed with current sustainability dialogues and personal experience, the essay lays bare the connections and contingencies between poetry, virtue, sustainability, and ecological existence
The Imagination of Interconnection: Laudato Si’ and Celtic Christian Spirituality
Get PDFThis article brings Pope Francis’s encyclical on the environment, Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home, into conversation with the modern spiritual movement of Celtic Christian spirituality, arguing that its contribution to Francis’ concept of an “integral ecology lived out joyfully and authentically” is its placing the imagination at the heart of interconnectivity. The paper will begin with a description of Francis’ concept of integral ecology, outlining its biblical foundations and spiritual import. Then it will introduce the recent movement in ‘Celtic’ Christian spirituality, arguing how, despite strong criticisms from Celtic scholars, it remains an important and influential spiritual movement that speaks to the concerns, aspirations, and insights of many people within contemporary Christian culture. One of those insights is in the role of the imagination in understanding humanity’s relation to its environment, which will be explored through the movement’s engagement with Alexander Carmichael’s Carmina Gadelica. And finally, the article will conclude with how the emphasis on the imagination links to contemporary understandings of the religious imagination and how its liberating and concretizing function can serve as a psychological and theological precondition for the incarnational principle of social justice as found in Oscar Romero’s address, “The Political Dimension of the Faith from the Perspective of the Option for the Poor.