Sustaining Church

We had the Hazelnut Community ‘Sustaining Church’ conference on Wednesday and Thursday this week.  The whole conference was incredibly inspiration, and left me with a sense that something very important is happening with environmental theology at the moment, and with our work at Hazelnut.  For me the standout presenters were Ellen Davis, Nurya Love Parish, and Norman Wirzba, but almost everything I saw was interesting and powerful.  In particular I was stuck by Norman Wirzba’s discussion of repentance and healing, and what this means for the Church and for me.  The environmental crisis is also a spiritual crisis, and a spiritual crisis requires some sort of spiritual response.  We don’t have all the answers, and in many cases we’re part of the problem, so we need to approach environmental theology in a state of humility and repentance.  The church that emerges through engaging with the environmental crisis will likely look very different to the church as we know it today.  I’m excited to be participating in this work.