Religion and Ecology 2026

   Integrated Reflection: Humans Scale within a Mass Society When I reflect on the influence of Romano Guardini, I continue to dwell on his concept of the “human scale,” which is easily swallowed up by our modern, mass-society structure. Guardini’s warnings about how a man is no longer the “Master of his own power” sit with me as I continue to observe contemporary public life. As humans, we often feel like little pieces in a massive technocratic machine, where the choices we make as individuals are ultimately inconsequential against the backdrop of the broader global systems. To me, the sense of “mass-society” and isolation (concepts from Hannah Arendt) are the primary reasons why ecological conversion is so difficult. When we begin to lose the human scale, we simultaneously begin losing the sense of personal responsibility. To us, who feel so small, it is so easy to forget the “cry of the earth,” specifically because it seems too vast and something we let the experts control,...

      A concept that I found quite intriguing and wanted to take further was how the technocratic paradigm is found within the digital world.  The digital world has allowed for the technocratic paradigm to find its home, resulting in its most recent and pervasive expression to date. When looking at Andrea Spina’s analysis of “augmented reality” and the “online experience", it highlights the blurring lines between what is physical and what is virtual, which is considered to be a new challenge for integral ecology. If we begin to spend our lives living within these digital environments, which were created solely for our convenience in day-to-day life and tailored to our personal preferences, we begin to lose the ability to encounter the “otherness” of nature (Spina). To some, nature can be seen as an inconvenient and messy aspect of our desires. However, in contrast to this messy incontinence, the digital paradigm is built on the logic of the algorithm, considered the ...

  The Destination of Goods and the Global Commons The theological principle of the “universal destination of goods” is the central claim regarding the social justice aspect of integral ecology. This concept ultimately challenges the very notion of absolute private property rights when they conflict with the dignity and survival of the human family. Looking at Vincent Miller’s work, he notes that Laudato si’ applies this traditional Catholic principle to what is known as the “global commons,” which includes things like the atmosphere and the oceans. These “global commons” are often seen as unowned resources at risk of exploitation within the technocratic framework. However, in their work, Holden and Mansfield point out that, in its theological position, the church insists that “the earth is essentially a shared inheritance." This part of the theological position then creates a direct link between both the “Option for the Poor” and environmental stewardship. When the theological fr...

  The “Throwaway Culture” The concept of the "throwaway culture” has been thrown around more frequently, but it is also a practical consequence of the technocratic paradigm. The concept of the “throwaway culture” is when either people or things are no longer useful, they are discarded. This is where the modern-day economic systems are the most challenged by the environmental position of Laudato si’ . In their work, Holden and Mansfield highlight how the church must confront climate change because the poor are the first to suffer the consequences of environmental degradation caused by the wealthy. The technocratic paradigm often suggests that technology, in itself, will eventually solve some of the world’s greatest problems, such as poverty and pollution. However, Francis argues that if a person's underlying heart does not change, this is only a “false promise” with no real benefits. Integral ecology requires an “ecological conversion,” a kind of shift we refer to as “the good ...

  Integral Ecology In his work, Francis offers a theological antidote called the “integral ecology.” This antidote focuses on protecting the “wilderness” as something completely separate from human civilization and posits that “everything is connected,” unlike secular environmentalism as a whole. When viewed this way, an individual's relationship with the environment is intertwined with their relationships with other individuals and with the divine. Ryszard Sadowski, an ecophilosopher, has noted that Pope Francis has expanded the term “ecology” to include the human, social, and cultural dimensions. The human spirit and social structures simultaneously begin to degrade as the technocratic paradigm degrades the environment. This can be most evidently found in what Francis calls “the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor." Within this theological framework, it is nearly impossible to address climate change without also addressing global poverty.  These two issues both stem fro...

 Continuing on with the trend of the ecology of Eden, chapter 4 begins to take a look at the origins of humans as the great hunter. In this chapter, Eisenberg argues that the human transition from scavenger to Hunter was a fundamental shift in our consciousness and in our relationship to the mountain.    An idea that stood out to me, was that of a Sacramento kill? Which Eisenberg explains that with early humans, hunting was not an act of violence, but a profound exchange. furthermore when a human kills and eats a wild animal, it is them taking the mountain in for themselves. In this example, there was a deep sense of gratitude, and more specifically how the hunter respected the prey as an equal, and also a fellow inhabitant of the wild source. Furthermore, he begins to contrast this with the tower approach, we have to animals which is domestication. We as humans have moved from the idea of hunting animals to herding them, which began the shift of an animal to stop being a...

Moving on into further chapters of the ecology of Eden, Evan Eisenberg, in chapter 3, discusses the grand archetypes that the mountain and the tower are, and into the space where they collide, which is called the garden. In this chapter, he then challenges, the popular thought that the wilderness is only something that can be found in untouched areas, such as the Amazon, or the deep Arctic. rather, Eisenberg believes that wilderness can actually be found everywhere. Something that I found fascinating, while reading chapter 2 is how he guards humans as edge creatures. He depicts how we tend to thrive in the boundaries between ecosystems, and specifically where the land meets the sea (funny because this is what we say almost every day when we do not understand each other). Discard the Isenberg introduces is our attempt to make that edge everywhere we go. however something that Eisenberg does warn us about is that if we begin to turn the entire planet into a garden and into that edge then...

 Recently, I've started to go back to The Ecology of Eden. In doing so, I have once again been intrigued by Evan Eisenberg's distinctions between the mountain and the tower. In chapter one, Eisenberg suggests that our relationship with nature is a struggle between two different archetypes. Firstly, we see the mountain, which in this case, represents the wild and unmanaged source of life. secondly the tower arty represents our human desire to control that unmanaged source of life. Something that stood out to me after going back through the chapters is that the mountain of God is an ecological fact, rather than just a simple myth. places with high altitudes act as the planets, ecological spigots furthermore and these places is where water and nutrients are gathered to be distributed amongst the lowlands. To me, bringing in my philosophical aspect into it seems as though the ancient spiritual leaders were actually traveling, as they climbed the mountains, to the cradle of all natu...

  Chapter 19, 'Leaping the Fence.' In this section, Eisenberg explores a massive psychological shift in how humans interact with nature. He starts by comparing the old 'Formal Garden'—think of the rigid, geometric lines of Versailles, with the 'English Landscape Garden.' The big idea here is that the French garden was about dominating nature through math and straight lines. But by the 18th century, that felt stifling. Designers like William Kent and 'Capability' Brown decided to 'leap the fence.' They wanted the garden to look like it wasn't a garden at all, but a wild, rolling meadow. Eisenberg’s question for us is: Is this actually freedom, or just a more clever form of control? "The most important technical tool in this chapter is the ha-ha. It’s a sunken fence or a ditch that keeps cattle out of the yard without blocking the view. Eisenberg uses the ha-ha as a metaphor for a 'Visual Lie.' Because the fence is invisible, the w...

 After completing the reading from Robert Farrar Capon's The Supper of the Lamb , I saw it kind of as a wake up call regarding how little I actually "see" the things that I interacr with on a day to day basis. In this work, Capon's central exercise is alot less about cooking, such as spending an entire hour with one singlular onion, but more about what he calls to be the "work of man." This concept of the "work of man" means to look at the world with enough love in order to see it as it actually is in its true, raw form, rather than seeing it as a simple "diagram."   On the same now, I was struck by Capon's critique of how we are able to replace reality with so many abstractions. Some examples that he uses to potray this is a calorie, and in this example he calls it a "conceit" or a "measurment of nothing." He calls it this because we cannot actually see nor taste a calorie as it lays within a piece of noodle or br...

 Ancient Egypt had a deep connection between religion and the environment, and the Nile was at the center of it. The river wasn't just a water source, it was sacred. The yearly flooding deposited fertile soil across the banks and people understood that both in practice and spiritually, their survival depended on working with that cycle rather than against it. That understanding showed up in how they lived, respecting animals, avoiding waste, treating the natural world as something worth maintaining. Compared to now it's hard not to notice the difference. They weren't perfect, but there was a sense that the environment was something to be in relationship with, not just something to takefrom.

 Much like music, the natural world has a certain rhythm to it. I had first heard the band Wednesday sometime within the last year. They had released a single for their most recent album on the 21st of May, 2025. I was drawn into the sound instantly, something about their lyrics being rooted in everyday rural life stood out to me. Talking about the intimate details of ones life with relatively mundane backgrounds from a small town feels meaningful. The song "Wound up here by holdin' on" really speaks out to me as the story of that song mirrors some events that have happened in my own life. Anyways, I saw them in concert recently and something that kept popping in my head is how concerts can create a strong feeling of connection, everyone having a similar level of energy and excitement. It almost feels like being a part of a hive mind. This feeling isn't too far off from what is described as the connection to something larger than oneself in a lot of religious and ecol...

The article Wilderness on a Wilderness Trail discusses whether or not it is possible to find true wilderness on wilderness trails. Well, wilderness trails are a curated experience for hikers and other individuals who want a legitimate wilderness experience. While much of the scenery is indeed wild, the paths, people, service areas, and litter found along wilderness trails are not entirely wild which takes away from the wilderness experience.

 The article Grace by Gary Snyder discusses why it is humans must kill to obtain food to survive while preaching that killing is wrong. Well, Snyder states that humans and most living organisms need to kill or at least outcompete other organisms to survive. Snyder states however that by saying grace before eating a meal is a sign of love and thanks for the organism that died to provide your meal. 

 The New York Times article assigned as a part of our class readings discussed the holistic ideology of 18th century German philosopher Friedrich Schelling, Schelling believed in a sense that the human mind is essentially a part of the environment. Similarly to deep ecology, Schelling believed that through exploring your relationship with nature you are able to have a better understanding of your place in the cosmos.

In the modern world industrialization is responsible for bringing mass numbers of people up out of poverty and giving them the luxuries of medicine, food security, energy, clean water, and the beneifts that follow suit.  But, industrialization, especially quick industrialization, wreaks havoc on the natural environment.  In some countries such as Brazil, those in poverty who would seek to use the rainforest to better their situation are criminalized for action such as mining or farming.  Not to say that these practices cannot be bettered, and certainly the corporations that exploit both people and environment are better off regulated, but the idea in general raises some questions.  Is this all just a product of the capitalistic market economy? Should policy protect the environment even at the expense of the misfortunate? Or is the entire premise false, is it the nature of the system in which the poor must destroy to become better that should be changed? 

Bible verses such as Proverbs 23:20 and 1 Corinthians 6:12 warn against the dangers of gluttony and associating with gluttons.  Gluttony is waste, overindulgence, and lazy in nature.  When Jesus performed the miracle of bread and fishes, he commanded his disciples to collect the leftovers to save.  Growing up in a southern baptist church, the blindness towards these principles were apparent, and in retrospect the influence of american consumer culture probably was responsible for much of this.  This is one side of the extreme, the other side would be extreme monasticism.  Either in excess is inhuman.  One must live in period of feast and fast.  

Chapter 6 of the Ecology of Eden textbook is about how humans and culture have evolved at the edge of chaos. The chapter discusses the creation and evolution of culture and how our relationship with nature turned into what it is in modern society. Eisenburg argues that culture itself is a natural occurrence seen throughout human existence. Culture forms from human reaction to chaos as a way to explain the natural phenomena of everyday life. Culture formed without language as we see evidence of cave painting that highlight that early humans did more than just hunt and mate. Even in modern times, counterculture forms as a reaction to instability or distrust in modern institutions.

 Chapter 5 of the Ecology of Eden textbook is about the concept that humans are modern day saprophages, essentially since we get most of our energy through fossil fuels which is decayed organic matter. The chapter goes on to explain the different ways in which we act as saprophages; from energy creation and consumption to the symbiotic relationship we have with machines. We take organic matter found deep within the earth, similar to the saprophage the mushroom, however we delve much deeper into the earth to that we find and use dense pockets of energy trapped in the ground. Now, mushrooms use the organic matter they find as energy to power their body. Humans use the fossil fuels that we find in the earth as energy for industry and to increase our the standard of living. However, fossil fuels do allow us to produce and farm on a grand scale in order to feed the growing population. Fossil fuels are used to power machines on farms that till the land, harvest the crops, and process the...

Chapter 20 was one of my favorites because it was about the US, so I found it relevant and interesting.  The idea that the early republic viewed the natural resources as literally inexhaustible and so could be used recklessly is interesting.  The development of our mass individual transportation networks as an extension of this idea is also interesting.  The idea that Eden became something to be commodified and sold is still present within American culture and easily observable almost anywhere.  People love to see things and look at them and own them but not experience them or be responsible for them.  In a society where literally everything becomes commodified relationships follow suit.