Forum on Religion and Ecology: Spotlights

• 5.19 Thinking with Plants and Fungi, with Rachael Petersen and Natalia Schwien Scott

  This episode features Rachael Petersen and Natalia Schwien Scott, who co-launched the “Thinking with Plants and Fungi Initiative” at the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard University in fall of 2022. We talk about the initiative and its culminating conference, which took place in May of 2025. We discuss their interdisciplinary exploration into how plants and fungi help us rethink the nature of mind and matter and humans’ relationship to the more-than-human world. You can learn more about the initiative and conference here: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/research-programming/thinking-plants-fungiStay tuned in upcoming weeks for an episode featuring Natalia and another episode featuring Rachael. They're doing exciting work at the forefront of the sort of issues addressed at the intersection of religion and ecology.

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• 5.18 Cosmic Life, Cosmic Purpose: A Review

  In this episode, our host (Sam Mickey) reviews two books that engage with questions about the place of life, meaning, and purpose in the universe. First, he discusses the anthology, Towards a Philosophy of Cosmic Life: New Discussions and Interdisciplinary Views, edited by David Bartosh, Attila Grandpierre, and Bei Peng (Springer, 2024). It's notable for its interdisciplinary and transnational perspectives on the inherence of life in the universe. It includes a wonderful chapter by John B. Cobb, Jr. (1925-2024), a scholar of ecological civilization steeped in the philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead. Second, Sam discusses Cosmic Purpose, by Kagawa Toyohiko (1888-1960) (Wipf and Stock, 2014). Kagawa was a Japanese philosopher and Evangelical Christian who, similar to the Jesuit paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, sought to align theological understanding of meaning and purpose with scientific discoveries of the evolution of life and the universe. If you are interested in ideas of purpose (teleology), these books are definitely worth reading.

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• 5.17 Flourishing Kin, with Yuria Celidwen

  This episode features Yuria Celidwen, PhD, a native of Indigenous Nahua and Maya lineages from the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. We discuss her work as a scholar, researcher, and writer working at the intersection of Indigenous studies, cultural psychology, and contemplative sciences. We focus in particular on her book, Flourishing Kin: Indigenous Wisdom for Collective Well-Being (2024). We also discuss some of the complexities involved with psychedelic research, including an article she co-authored, "Ethical Principles of Traditional Indigenous Medicine to Guide Western Psychedelic Research and Practice."

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• 5.16 Mother, Creature, Kin, with Chelsea Steinauer-Scudder

  This episode features Chelsea Steinauer-Scudder, a writer at the confluence of relationship to place with experiences of the sacred. She has a masters of theological studies from Harvard Divinity School, and she's worked as a staff writer and editor for Emergence Magazine. Her writings have been published in numerous venues. We talk about her personal and professional journey into the intersection of religion and ecology, particularly with reference to her new book, Mother, Creature, Kin: What We Learn from Nature's Mothers in a Time of Unraveling (Broadleaf Books, 2025). From microbes to megafauna and everything in between, the natural world is full of lessons about care, kinship, and mothering, lessons that ca provide support during our transitional time.

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• 5.15 Trees for Earth Day, with Beth Nortcross, Leah Rampy, & Laura Pustarfi

  On this special Earth Day episode, we feature the work of three writers who focus on the wonderful world of trees: Beth Norcross, Leah Rampy, and Laura Pustarfi. Beth and Leah are the authors of the new book (released on Earth Day 2025), Discovering the Spiritual Wisdom of Trees. Laura is the editor of an anthology (co-edited with David Macauley), The Wisdom of Trees: Thinking Through Arboreality (forthcoming in June 2025). Enjoy this thought-provoking discussion about trees and the questions they raise about agency, value, intelligence, wisdom, and relationality.

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