{"id":9427,"date":"2022-07-10T21:28:23","date_gmt":"2022-07-11T01:28:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/?p=9427"},"modified":"2022-07-15T09:43:42","modified_gmt":"2022-07-15T13:43:42","slug":"ecological-spirituality-workshop-day-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/2022\/07\/ecological-spirituality-workshop-day-one\/","title":{"rendered":"Ecological spirituality workshop, day one"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

You’ll find a quick summary of what we did in the ecological spirituality workshop today below the iNaturalist link.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My iNaturalist observations for July 10<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Introduction to iNaturalist.org<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

While we were waiting for everyone to arrive, I gave a quickie introduction to iNaturalist.org (for iPhone<\/a> — for Android<\/a> — or just set up your account on the website). The developers think of this as a kind of social media app for naturalists, but the data collected has also been used by scientists. A companion app called Seek (for iPhone<\/a> — for Android<\/a>) is great for use with kid’s programs, or for casual users. Please note<\/em>: if you’d like to use iNaturalist (not Seek) with kid’s programs, I strongly recommend reading the iNaturalist Teacher’s Guide<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nature name game<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

To learn names, we played a variation of the Animal Name Game<\/a>. Instead of choosing just any animal, we each choose an organism (animal, plant, fungus, etc.) that was native to the ecosystem we’re in now. So we had Dan Dodder, Jill Jay, Jessica Juniper, Eric Elm, Esther Egret, Ben Birch, and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tree sensory immersion<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Pick a tree. Lie down on the ground, with your head near the trunk of the tree, belly down. Imagine the root structure underneath the tree: how far down does it go, how wide is it, what other organisms live among the roots? (You can imagine the roots are like the basement of a skyscraper, if that helps.) Then turn on your back and look up into the branches. Go up level by level. (You can imagine this as going up in a elevator in a skyscraper.) What lives on each level?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a quarter of an hour or so, we gathered together again. Those who wished to could say what they saw, heard, smelled, tasted, felt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Introductory lecturette<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

What do we mean by \u201cspirituality\u201d? Here\u2019s one definition: spirituality is a way to address the big questions of life. These questions might include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 What ought I do?
\u2022 What\u2019s the purpose of my life?
\u2022 What kind of being am I?
\u2022 What is the source and nature of goodness?
\u2022 What is the source and nature of suffering and evil?
\u2022 How do I know what is true?
\u2022 Does my life have any meaning?
\u2022 Where does meaning come from?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many people believe these questions should either be addressed by science. But these questions are answered by individuals. Science by its very nature cannot address questions of what you as an individual should do (that\u2019s not a reproducible result). That\u2019s why we need spirituality, to help us address these big questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this workshop, we\u2019ll explore spirituality, that is, we\u2019re going to meditate on life\u2019s big questions. Our meditation will be less about talking, and more about doing. And we\u2019re going to explore spirituality beyond just humankind to include the non-human world as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are in the middle of an ecological crisis. Or, more precisely, we\u2019re in the middle of several ecological crises. Dr. Stuart Weiss, a Stanford-trained biologist who now works in environmental remediation, identifies five major threats to earth\u2019s life supporting systems:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. Global climate change
2. Land use change (including deforestation and habitat destruction)
3. Invasive organisms
4. Toxication (including chemical pollution, solids like plastics, etc.)
5. Overpopulation<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These threats to earth\u2019s life supporting systems result in a phenomenon sometimes called \u201ceco-grief.\u201d Eco-grief makes many of life\u2019s big questions even more urgent, plus eco-grief can be so overwhelming that we shut down and don\u2019t do anything. So one major purpose of ecological spirituality is making sure we don\u2019t shut down due to eco-grief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two last important points. First, I believe spirituality always happens in community. Second, even though I\u2019ve spent the last several minutes talking at you, from what I\u2019ve seen, most people experience spirituality through doing, not through talking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ecojustice elder<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Today’s Ecojustice Elder was Henry Thoreau<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reading<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Today’s reading was Smokey the Bear Sutra by Gary Snyder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You’ll find a quick summary of what we did in the ecological spirituality workshop today below the iNaturalist link. My iNaturalist observations for July 10.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[843],"class_list":["post-9427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-religious-education","tag-ecological-spirituality"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9427"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9434,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9427\/revisions\/9434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}