Rooted Faith: Practices for Living Well on a Fragile Planet

“This book is a winsome, accessible meditation on creation as the environmental crisis looms over us.  It lives at the intersection of gospel faith, indigenous religion, and earthly reality of belonging to and with and for the earth.”   – Walter Bruggemann

“’Christianity in its biblical roots is grounded in the earth,’ argue s Sarah Renee Werner in this refreshing and readable introduction to Christian creation care/earth spirituality/ecotheology…. She commends spiritual practices of reembodiment throughout to deepen personal and political wholeness and hope.  An ideal book group resource.”  – Ched  Myers

Myers is right, it would be a good group discussion book.  Each chapter begins with a scripture quotation as a focus of the chapter, and concludes with a practice that invites the reader to engage in an activity or thought that helps make Werner’s thoughts practical (such as ‘earthing’, walking barefoot on the earth; or researching whose land we dwell on, which some churches have endeavored to do.)

Werner uses the term kin-dom of God rather than kingdom, to show that all things, living, plant, animal, waters, mountains, rocks, all are our kin, all part of God’s creation and caring presence.  She believes that our consumer oriented, industrial centered, economics driven culture is antithetical to God’s creative purpose.  “Our love of technology and commitment to comfort make it almost impossible to see the aliveness of the earth around us,” she states.

Werner grounds her book thesis in the premise that climate action is to be seen as critical on a personal and community level.  In the last chapter, “A New Heaven and a New Earth”, quoting Revelation, she states:  “The world is currently experiencing a climate change revolution, and deep and lasting change cannot come from big government alone; it also requires millions of communities working on a local level to repair the earth.”  COP23 made that abundantly clear, governments and industries need their feet held to the fire of caring for the earth.

In her conclusion, Werner states:  “At the beginning of this book, I named two main tensions I feel as a Christian and an environmentalist living on this fragile, beautiful planet.  First, the Bible calls us to live differently from what our consumer culture expects.  Secondly, the world often feels like a perilous place. I truly believe that the most powerful antidote to climate despair and guilt is to find joy and wonder by doing things like worshiping in the forest.  With that thought, I believe I will step outside and take a walk in the woods.

John Hanson