"Worldly Wonder" is an excellent introduction to the new academic field of religion and ecology. The text is taken from the Second Master Hsuan Hua Memorial lecture given by Mary Evelyn Tucker co-founder of the Forum on Religion and Ecology. Professor Tucker’s lecture was given at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkley in March of 2002. Succinct, well written, reader friendly, and organized, the book contains Dr. Tucker’s presentation, a response by Graduate Theological Union professor Judith A. Berling, audience responses, Dr. Tucker’s responses to audience questions, and a series of six appendices that reprint important documents in the field of religion and ecology. Selections here range from final statements of the 1990 Global Forum in Moscow, to 1992’s statement by the Union of Concerned Scientists calling for religions to get involved in helping to solve the environmental crisis, to the United Nation’s Earth Charter. All these components make this small volume an excellent introduction to religion and ecology, and also make it very usable in the secondary school classroom.

The lecture section is organized into six contexts for this study: cosmological, historical, religious, pluralistic, transformative, and comprehensive. Here Dr. Tucker asks us to both understand and give meaning to, the scientific revolutions of the last century in particular, which have contextualized our place within the universe. "If scientific cosmology gives us an understanding of the origins and unfolding of the universe, the story of cosmology gives us a sense of our place in the universe (3)." The importance of seeing and understanding that the earth and humans are both integrally connected to and embedded in the evolution of the universe and thus in the evolution and biology of the earth cannot be overstated enough. This understanding has far reaching consequences for just about every major human endeavor. According to Dr. Tucker the world’s religions must rethink their place in the world in light of the knowledge that science is giving us about the world. "The challenge for religions is both to revision our role as citizens of the universe and to reinvent our niche as members of the Earth community. This requires addressing such cosmological questions as where we have come from and where we are going. In other words, it necessitates rethinking our role as humans within the larger context of universe evolution as well as in the closer context of natural processes of life on Earth (8)."

The second section, "Historical Context: Change and Continuity," briefly looks at the historical development of religions. "The world’s religions, while grounded in fundamental beliefs and practices, have never been static, but have always been affected by change in response to intellectual, political, cultural, social, and economic forces (12)." The purpose of this line of thought is to show that religions have, do, and can change and adapt to the needs of the world around them. Ms. Tucker sees global religions currently in a postmodern era. "In our postmodern era, new constructive syntheses are emerging in light of deconstructive analyses of hegemonic thought along with liberating calls to move beyond outdated practices (13)." Her thesis here is that this postmodern phase represents a moment "when religions are beginning to move into their ecological phase and find planetary expression (14)." Within her historical overview she notes, quite rightly I think, the human rights revolution of the twentieth century "has not yet sufficiently situated these individual human rights in relation to community responsibility to other persons, other species, or the planet as a whole. As the industrial revolution of the nineteenth century coupled with market capitalism of the twentieth century spreads to every corner of the globe, religions are severely challenged to offer an alternative vision to the prevailing economic view of humans as primarily producers and consumers in the global market (16)."

In "The Religious Context: Problems and Promises" Dr. Tucker reminds us clearly that "In acknowledging their problematic dimensions, we need to underscore the dark side of religious traditions as well as their lateness in awakening to the environmental crisis. In addition, we should note the ever-present gap between ideal principles and real practices as well as the inevitable disjunction between modern environmental problems and traditional religious resources. For all these reasons, religions are necessary, but not sufficient for solutions to environmental problems. Thus they need to be in dialogue with other religions and other disciplines in focusing on environmental issues (19)." This realistic assessment points to a number of important issues. First, solving the environmental crisis will only take place through combined efforts and from a variety of disciplines. The question still remains: What ideology is going to be strong enough to get people to change the way they live? Science alone has not been able to do this and neither has religion. Dr. Tucker says, "Thus we affirm the actual and potential contribution of religious ideas for informing and inspiring ecological theology, environmental ethics, and grass-roots activism."

Through the next section, "Pluralistic Perspectives" she keeps reminding us that the environmental crisis can only be solved through a variety of methods and disciplines, and that in terms of religions this impulse must certainly be pluralistic as well. The needs are global and so must the response be. From there in the section "The Transformative Context: Reclaiming and Reconstructing," she explores dimensions of religion (dogma, rituals and symbols, moral authority, soteriology, and ethics) that need to be reevaluated in light of the current planetary environmental crisis. For example, in discussing ritual and symbols she says, "For religious rituals and symbols to be vibrant, they need o be connected to the living world, even if they point beyond it. A deep numinous mystery resides in this connection and when rituals and symbols are disconnected from this reality they cannot activate a resonance with the ineffable power that sustains life. Hence, they become withered and attenuated (39)."

The final section, "The Comprehensive Context: Restoration of Wonder," calls us to rediscover the sense of wonder inherent in the world. "Religions have traditionally been a means of expanding the measure of the mind through the power of the religious imagination; now is the moment for the religions to move forward boldly with comprehensive narrative perspectives that are grounded in relevant traditional resources, open to a sense of wonder, and guided by inspiring moral visions for shaping human-Earth relations for a sustainable future (51)." We are all asked to reawaken to the "beauty, complexity, and mystery of life itself (52)" that we are so deeply embedded in.

"Worldly Wonder" is an excellent introduction to the field of religion and ecology. The core ideas here are elegantly presented by Dr. Tucker. The volume is highly readable and would be an excellent addition to the secondary school curriculum in a wide variety of areas. I cannot recommend it too highly.

review ©2003 by Tom Collins and RSiSS
Palmer Trinity School
Miami, Florida