Grounded: Conversations on Nature and Climate Change

Over the past year, the Earth & Spirit Center, with funding from the Kalliopeia Foundation, has collaborated with Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest to create two documentary films featuring environmental activists working on climate change and watershed health. In this episode of the podcast, we’ve taken audio clips from some of the interviews we conducted and have woven them together to present the perspectives of several activists of various ages, races, and backgrounds, united by their common concern about our changing climate.

Resources:

Earth & Spirit Center homepage: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/

“Grounded” film: https://youtu.be/fL_rHzS3rcQ

“Reflections on Water” film: https://youtu.be/LwgJZPmQugE

Dr. Justin Mog’s “Sustainability Now” program on Forward Radio: https://www.forwardradio.org/sustainabilitynow

Renewable Energy Alliance of Louisville: https://renewableenergylouisville.org/

Outdoor Afro: https://outdoorafro.org/

Sisters of Charity of Nazareth, office of ecological sustainability: https://nazareth.org/office-of-ecological-sustainability/

Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest: https://bernheim.org/

Kalliopeia Foundation: https://kalliopeia.org/

Aging with Grace and Dignity: Phyllis SanAngelo on Claiming the Spiritual Gifts of Elderhood

Phyllis SanAngelo is a mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother with decades of experience from a long career in spiritual formation and hospice work. She also facilitates a “Conscious Eldering” course at the Earth & Spirit Center. This conversation is a reflection on what it means to age with grace, dignity, and active intentionality, claiming the great spiritual gifts of elderhood.

RESOURCES:

Earth & Spirit Center website: www.earthandspiritcenter.org

Phyllis’s course on Becoming a Conscious Elder: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/class/becoming-a-conscious-elder/

Showing up Curious and Intentional: Deryl Sweeney on the Power of Mindful Questions

Deryl Sweeney is an entrepreneur, business coach, and the co-founder of Cure CF, a nonprofit that raises funds to support cystic fibrosis research. In this episode, Deryl and host Kyle Kramer reflect on how mindful curiosity and intentional commitment to core values can help all of us show up as leaders, deeply rooted in love and connection.

RESOURCES:

Everything is Conscious: Kathleen Deignan on Contemplation, Creativity, and Community

Sr. Kathleen Deignan is a Sister of the Congregation of Notre Dame and a professor emerita of religious studies at Iona College. She’s also an accomplished composer and singer. In this episode, which weaves in music that she wrote and performed, Kathleen shares the wisdom of the Shaker community, Thomas Merton, Thomas Berry, and other spiritual exemplars of courageous, contemplative creativity, who invite us into new ways of being together and embracing the beautiful dance of our evolving world.

Resources:

Passionist Earth & Spirit Center: www.earthandspiritcenter.org

Kathleen Deignan, CND Institute for Earth and Spirit at Iona College: https://www.iona.edu/academics/schools-institutes/kathleen-deignan-cnd-institute-earth-and-spirit

Thomas Berry Forum for Ecological Dialogue at Iona College: https://www.iona.edu/academics/schools-institutes/kathleen-deignan-cnd-institute-earth-and-spirit/thomas-berry-forum

American Teilhard Society: https://teilharddechardin.org/

Kathleen Deignan’s music on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeyGG2o20TkjWxpDiE9up_g

 

We See from Where We Stand: Sr. Caroljean Willie SC, PhD on Multicultural Perspectives and Stepping into our “Grace Margin”

Sr. Caroljean Willie, who goes by CJ, is a Sister of Charity of Cincinnati. With a doctorate in multicultural education, she has worked in 48 countries as an environmental educator, teacher-trainer, and cultural diversity consultant. She has also served as an NGO representative at the United Nations, working on social development, education, environmental sustainability, human trafficking, interfaith dialogue and poverty eradication. In this podcast, Sr. Caroljean shares her insights about how we might lean into interconnection and step out into what she calls our grace margin, where we can truly learn from and care about those whose lives are very different from our own.

RESOURCES:

Earth & Spirit Center website: www.earthandspiritcenter.org

EarthConnection, a ministry of the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati and run by Sr. Caroljean, is a center for learning and reflection about living lightly on Earth: https://www.scearthconnection.org/

Sr. Caroljean’s June 24-26 2022 retreat at the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth retreat center: “Called to Hope: Catholic Social Teaching and the Environment” https://nazarethretreatcenterky.org/retreat/called-to-hope/

Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati: https://www.srcharitycinti.org/

United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: https://sdgs.un.org/goals

United Nations Millennium Development Goals: https://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/

Microfinancing Partners in Africa: https://microfinancingafrica.org/who-we-are/

Balancing Profit and Purpose: Scott Koloms on Mindful Business Leadership

Scott Koloms believes that businesses can both make money and do good. He is the President and CEO of Louisville, KY-based Facilities Management Services, the first janitorial service company in the world to be certified as a B-corporation, committed to a “triple bottom line” of financial profit along with social and environmental benefits. He is also the Founder of Canopy, a non-profit working to help other Kentucky businesses evolve toward greater sustainability. In this episode, Scott reflects on his commitment to mindful leadership and his drive to help other for-profit businesses strike a balance between profit and purpose.

RESOURCES:

Facilities Management Services website: https://facilitiesmgmt.com/

Canopy KY – Making Kentucky First in Good Business: https://canopyky.org/

B-corporations: https://www.bcorporation.net/en-us/

Earth & Spirit Center website: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/

Donate to support the Earth & Spirit Podcast: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/donate/

A Journey of Healing: Mary Underwood on Wholeness for People and Planet

In addition to a career in nursing and a graduate degree in philosophy, cosmology, and consciousness, Mary Underwood has through-hiked the 2600-mile Pacific Crest Trail and other long-distance wilderness treks. Through all of this, the search for healing – personal and planetary – has been her compass. In this broad, rich conversation about health, spirituality, and deep connection to nature, Mary and I reflect on curiosity and vulnerability as key spiritual virtues, the art of solitude and deep listening, and how there is profound, hopeful medicine in the embrace of woundedness.

RESOURCES:

More info on “Awakening to the Land,” Mary’s upcoming April 23, 2022 half-day nature retreat at the Earth & Spirit Center: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/class/awakening-to-the-land/

Earth & Spirit Center website: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/

Donate to support the nonprofit Earth & Spirit Center podcast: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/donate/

California Institute for Integral Studies: https://www.ciis.edu/academics/graduate-programs/philosophy-cosmology-and-consciousness

Cameron Howard – Bonus Material

When we recorded the “A Made-By-Hand Life: Cameron Howard and a Deep Love of the Local” episode with farmer-philosopher-musician Cameron Howard, there was more to the interview than would fit in the podcast episode.  Here is some bonus material.

A Made-By-Hand Life: Cameron Howard and a Deep Love of the Local

Farmer-philosopher-musician Cameron Howard farms with horses on the 71-acre farm that he and his family call home in southern Indiana. In this episode, recorded on the Howard farm amidst the domestic background noises of their hand-built home, we reflect on how the spiritual and material intertwine in the joys and challenges of a made-by-hand life, crafted with deep intentionality and thoughtfulness.

NOTES AND RESOURCES:

All of the music on this podcast was written and performed by Cameron Howard. Click here for the most recent album from Cameron and the Howard Family: https://www.amazon.com/Farm-Fresh-Howards/dp/B002PETCZS

Earth & Spirit Center website: www.earthandspiritcenter.org

There was more to this interview than would fit in the podcast episode. For bonus material, please click here: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/cameron-howard-bonus-material/

The Secular Sacred: Kathleen Dean Moore on Moral Integrity and a Ferocious Love of the World

Dr. Kathleen Dean Moore is a philosopher, nature writer, and environmental activist who makes her home in Oregon and Alaska. In this conversation, Kathleen reflects on her fierce, reverent love of this worthy and wounded world and its secular sacredness, and how we’re called beyond hope and despair to act with moral integrity for its healing.

RESOURCES:

Earth & Spirit Center website: https://www.earthandspiritcenter.org/

Kathleen’s website and blog: https://www.riverwalking.com/

Kathleen’s most recent book: Earth’s Wild Music: Celebrating Life in a Time of Extinction. https://www.riverwalking.com/earths-wild-music.html