The Birth of a Forest begins with TREES
Whitney A. Bauman and Dana Spottswood

    The birth of a tree is a most precarious and fascinating process; the odds are stacked heavily against the survival of any one seed. The emergence of the Theological Roundtable for Ecological Ethics and Spirituality (TREES), at the Graduate Theological Union has been no less wondrous. Just as a forest is made up of many trees and no one tree can sustain the life and biodiversity that a forest can, so TREES is both built upon its many members and enriches both their own lives and the life of the GTU community. This year marks the second birthday of TREES. At the ripe old age of two, membership thrives and affirmations of the groups presence in the world of higher theological education abound. The GTU is a bit like an old growth forest in that it is built on and supports an intricate network of life forms and ways of living. It provides the canopy for a consortium of 9 member schools and numerous affiliate centers all of which sport a wide range of worldviews, theological beliefs, and religious traditions. Thus, the GTU provides its students with a unique ecumenical learning context. TREES is strengthened and shaped by the various age groups, backgrounds, cultures, ethnicities, and faith identities at the GTU.
    The motivating factor that drew TREES together was the excitement that comes from a diverse group of people who find fellowship around a deep feeling that environmental issues should be far more visible in both curricula and in everyday conversation. Yet, as any activist knows, raising awareness is never as easy as meeting other like-minded folk. Juggling the gifts, strengths, and interests of all members while working toward larger, common goals is the work of leaders. The blessing of TREES is that it is a consensus-based, non-hierarchical group; thus, organization and decision-making must occur from the ground up, effectively utilizing all members as both leaders and students. The canopy that TREES provides is made up of its many members but also serves to extend the roots of those members lives into the GTU community, so that together they may embrace their roles in the larger Earth-community.
    The string of coincidences that led to the groups formation began in fall of 1998 when Katherine Jesch, a Master of Divinity candidate at the Starr King School for the Ministry and former career administrator/ public policy employee of the U.S. Forest Service, took advantage of Starr Kings liberal teaching policy. This policy allows for qualified GTU students to offer their own courses and seminars when their areas of expertise serve the interests of the GTU community. Katherine proposed and got approval for a course entitled, "The Interdependent Web of Life: Building a Theology of Ecology."
    Until fairly recently this course proposal may have received a look of confusion for using the term "theology." Perhaps it would have been suggested that the title be changed to "The Interdependent Web of Life: Building an Ethics of Ecology" or something to that effect. Ecologically related coursework at the GTU, as in most theological institutions of education, has been limited to the occasional environmental ethics class. There is one exception to this rule. Professor Carol Robb at San Francisco Theological Seminary has been teaching an introductory ethics course through the lens of environmental issues every year for the past 15 years. Included as a part of her course, is a practical project that the class must commit to by participating in the project's creation and maintenance. Such things as an organic community garden (still in existence today on the SFTS campus) and solar water heaters have come out of these class projects.
    Though the differences between academic areas of specialty are sometimes misleading and very small, the difference between Katherine's course falling under "theology" instead of "ethics" is worthy of discussion. To relegate environmental issues to the realm of ethics is (at least in part) to ignore the underlying worldviews and systems of thought and behaviors that give rise to specific symptoms. It is, in a sense, to treat only the symptoms while ignoring the underlying illness. To situate ecological concerns within the realm of Systematic Theology and Spirituality is to underscore that the Earth and its delicate systems of life, of which humans are one part, must itself become the lens through which faith and works are interpreted. We must begin to understand ourselves to be interrelated parts of a wider earth community. We must begin to understand that our past, present, and future is deeply tied with those of all other life forms. Instead of focusing solely on how to clean up this oil spill, we must begin to look at the ways in which oil production and consumption adversely affects many life forms on the planet and search for sources of energy that promote the common good. Furthermore, we must begin to see that we are killing ourselves as well as other forms of life on the planet, every time an oil spill occurs, every day that the rainforest is destroyed, and every time a species goes extinct. In light of both the Earths creative capacities and its vulnerabilities, western structures of academia are now beginning to value profound eco-theological and philosophical insights and mysteries such as sacramental beauty, unpredictable violence, and revelatory wisdom, as subjects worthy of exploration. Katherine's class at the GTU opened up these theological floodgates for a few lucky students.
    Katherine and her seven students, through passionate discussions, informed reflection, and a lot of reading, all quickly felt that this course in Eco-theology was their most important and most relevant class. The realization that sooner or later, humans would cease to thrive as a part of any kind of community, be it faith-, family-, neighborhood-, or business-based, without first re-envisioning humans as members of a single earth-based community of life gradually occurred to the whole class. This fundamental insight means that we (as humans) must become students of the earth. At the end of the semester the students felt as though their work together had only just begun and they knew that if they were to continue this work they would have to stay together in some shape, form, or fashion. Companionship had made their work both energizing and hopeful where working in isolation often resulted in despair at the overwhelming nature of the ecological crisis.
    A certain amount of uncertainty and unpredictability reigns over a group in the earliest stages of its birth. Will the group grow or die? In which direction will the group grow? There are many possibilities that face a group in its seedling stage, before it takes some sort of definite form. For example, Katherine offered one way for the group to proceed. She offered to record book suggestions throughout the semester and compile them into a cumulative bibliography that would be distributed to the whole class at the semesters end. The list grew so quickly that the idea of forming a reading group the following spring seemed like a logical direction to take. However, after the first couple of meetings during the spring term many members of the group realized that full course loads with long required reading lists would make it impossible to commit to any extracurricular reading. Still, no one wanted to stop meeting. The needs for ecological reflection in our larger community and our own personal desires to see the seedlings that were planted in Kathryn's class grow, provided the fodder for TREES to grow into a group of fellowship, reflection, and action.
    With the right amount of direction and desire in place, the group needed some organization. Joan Randall, a part-time student at Pacific School of Religion, commuted from Davis to attend meetings. After such a lengthy commute, she did not want to waste time. In order to make the most of our time together, she instructed us in the art of organizing a meeting, skills she learned from Interaction Associates in San Francisco. With roles assigned and agendas distributed, brainstorming sessions were not only productive, but they led to the prioritization and choosing of individual and/or committee responsibilities. Meetings were empowering and results were immediate. For instance, a recycling program was revived at one of the GTU member schools. The program at this school had lapsed, so one TREES member helped to acquire new bins for the school, gather support from students and staff, explain what was and was not recyclable, and create a schedule to transport the bins to and from the curbs every week. We also branched out beyond the GTU community when Katherine helped plan an environmental website for the Seventh Principle Project, a project of the Unitarian Universalists.
    As each member branched out with the support of a base community, Susannah Lach, another Starr King student, began envisioning ways we could focus our energies at the GTU in a positive and unifying manner. One such way was to hold an Earth Day Fair at the GTU. In the spring of 1999, TREES held an Earth Day Fair on the lawn of the Pacific School of Religion,(1) outside of the buildings where many GTU classes are held. TREES members could have walked away from that experience disheartened due to the lack of response from students and faculty, but as the strong wind distributed flyers and toppled displays, the sacred dance and poetry readings went on in a spirit of reverence. As we conversed with confused onlookers who were just beginning to comprehend who we were and why we were there, we began to sense the importance of this small event in the forming of an ecumenical student group around a common, worthy cause. Such a goal might be considered essential to the academic life of any institution of higher education, but this ideal was no doubt more strongly held by the GTUs founders.
    On a campus whose obstacles include a lack of housing, financial burdens that force a majority of students to work other jobs while going to school, and the consortial reality of multi-denominational schools that often funnel students social interactions into activities with others of their same denomination, ecumenism is indeed an achievement. TREES first Earth Day event encouraged us to persist and heed the lessons that we learned.
    On that same Earth Day, the city of Berkeley began to recognize the existence of a faith-based approach to the environment when TREES members marched with banner in the annual "eco-motion" parade. Across symbols, and images of "Holy Hill" (as the GTU campus neighborhood is often called), our banner read "TREES: In solidarity with our sacred Earth." We had settled on a group name and acronym just in time, in fact, one of the most valuable lessons we learned that year was that no group will survive very long at GTU without a catchy acronym! Though we made a presence at the Berkeley event, we realized that there was much work still to be done. When the banner was met with mostly polite nods, inquisitive stares, and the rare honk, we knew that we would have to be more intentional about inserting ourselves into the local community or else we might never ground our theological inquiries in the living context of our bioregion. We responded by renting space for a table at the following years Earth Day event. Among the usual array of catalogs, ads, books, and posters, we constructed an altar-like arrangement of earthly art and sat back for what we thought would be a great day of listening to the speakers and catching up with one another. Imagine our delight as the hours flew by in ardent conversations with interested passers-by. We took turns answering questions and publicizing our upcoming forums at the GTU.
    Later that month, we followed the lead of TREES member Laura-Hummingbird who had become active in the political battle to reduce the pollution of Integrated Environmental Systems medical waste incinerator in Oakland. We attended and spoke out at a public hearing on dioxin and other dangers and injustices posed by the pollution of a low-income neighborhood. Susannah accompanied Laura on one of her prayer-witness pilgrimages of protest at the incinerator site where they meditated and held signs. In more ways than one, we began to make ourselves known in the wider Berkeley-Oakland community.
    During our first few on-campus events we discovered that in order to organize a group of people around any given issue, we had to approach it from the target community's primary perspective. At the GTU, the atmosphere is first and foremost academic, even though a religious perspective grounded in a tradition of worship supports this atmosphere of teaching. In January 2000, TREES started planning an academic forum featuring three renowned scholars from the intersecting fields of psychology and literature (Anita Barrows), feminist criticism (Susan Griffin), and systematic theology (John Cobb). Needless to say, the overflowing and appreciative audience was very encouraging. This occasion, entitled "Nonviolence towards the Earth" became a turning point for the group; we gained confidence in our voice and began to perceive part of our role at the GTU to be providing places for cooperation among its many schools, affiliate centers, and groups. We also set a precedent in collaborations between the GTU and UC Berkeley by incorporating our forum into the UC Berkeley Earth Week 2000 schedule. UC Berkeley pamphlets highlighted the TREES forum as the main event that evening. Furthermore, the day after the forum TREES sent two representatives from the GTU (one Buddhist and one Christian) to UC Berkeley to partake in a student panel on religious imperatives to protect the Earth. The younger UC students (many of them freshmen!) who organized this week-long celebration were dedicated to the same things that we were, which made getting to know them both humbling and exciting.
    Later in the spring of 2000, TREES initiated the lunchtime conversation sessions during which a guest speaker presents his or her work and responds to questions over lunch. These roundtables have been met with such positive feedback from GTU students, both TREES members and non-members, that they have become the focus of our work this year. Behind the scenes however, grant opportunities for future conferences and projects are being explored.
    Throughout the groups journey, individuals have continued on their own paths of eco-ministry: Ruth Fiscella has led eco-retreats for Presbyterian congregations, Craig Scott and others participated in the inter-faith organization of Bay Area faith communities (now known as the Spiritual Alliance For Earth, SAFE) Earth Day celebrations and Craig continues to represent TREES at SAFE meetings, and Joellynn Monahan planned our first annual educational organic wine and food-tasting event.
    Together TREES members rejoice at the fact that we have stumbled into one another's lives and found some common paths, paths of action that might indeed help mend the bonds between humans and the rest of creation. In addition to hard work, we recognize the needs for rest, play, creativity, and growth. With an almost entirely new group of members, the group has gotten back in touch with its root concerns of unearthing the often-buried concern for the fate of the Earth that people carry in their hearts. Liturgies like the Winter Solstice service that the group sponsors continue to be a source of hope and healing for TREES members. As we send forth those who must leave us each year because of graduation and/or their personal vocations, we welcome new people who share our wish to restore the Earths health.
    The fact that our group has been so dynamic and so ready to change with the changing GTU seasons has been both a blessing and bane. It has been a blessing because it allows us to respond to the ecological needs of a changing community; it has been a bane because our members come and go in a way that makes it hard to think past a few years at a time. This year our goal is to address the issue of long-term changes that need to take place within the GTU community. We want to create a group that lives on past our own interests and limited abilities to organize the GTU community. We want to create a group that can weather all of the seasons at the GTU. To this end we are going to begin to seek grant monies to fund some of our projects with the hope that one day, TREES will become an affiliated center at the GTU.
    Three of the projects that we are seeking funding for fall in line with our threefold mission. The mission of TREES is to raise awareness of the issues that surround the ecological demise of the earth. We focus on raising awareness at the Educational/Philosophical, Institutional/Physical-Structural, and Communal/Bioregional levels. By raising environmental awareness, we hope to provide a catalyst for change towards a more sustainable way of life for all life on the planet.
    The Educational component of our mission includes forums sponsored by TREES on pertinent environmental issues, like the ones we already sponsor biweekly at the GTU. These forums explore a wide variety of topics including sustainable energy technologies, process theology, ecological concepts of the self, animal rights, and eco-theologies. Students, staff, and faculty at the GTU, and members of the larger bay area community are invited to speak at these forums. Through grant money, we hope to expand the educational component of our mission by organizing a large conference on the "greening" of higher education, distributing literature in the form of a newsletter, paper, or journal, developing a web site, and compiling an ecumenical eco-ministry resource center.
    It is our belief that a major part of the mass ecological destruction, social injustices, and economic inequities that we face at the beginning of the 21st century are due to impoverished ways of knowing (and thus being in) the world. These epistemologies and their accompanying pedagogies create a fragmentation of knowledge in the academy, in society, and in culture; they teach us to see the world dualistically and hierarchically. We are conditioned to believe that religion and science, economics and the environment, and politics and ethics all represent hermeneutically sealed disciplines. We are led to believe that they are distinct ways of talking about the world whose languages are incompatible. Likewise, dominant western models of education (and thus the dominant modus operandi in the west by which culture is transmitted) teach us that there is an ontological split between matter and energy, spirit and body, mind and brain, humans and nature, and in many cases God or the Divine and the world. These fallacies are transmitted through our educational institutions and they are fueling the destructive ways in which we relate to other humans, other animals, other plants, and the earth itself. For this reason we feel the need to organize a conference based upon "ecological" epistemologies and pedagogies.
    We feel that we are but a part of the 14 billion years old process that we call cosmic- and geo- evolution. As a part of the whole, we must begin to learn how to live in communion with the rest of life on the planet. Toward this end, what might different academic disciplines look like? What might an ecological economics, like the community-based economics that John Cobb and Herman Daly describe in their book For the Common Good, look like? What might an ecological approach to medicine look like? What are the ecological insights that the worlds religions and philosophical systems have to teach us? What do the pedagogies that arise out of ecological approaches to the many different ways of knowing look like? These are the questions that we think need to be addressed by higher education. The ways that we answer questions about who we as humans are, where we come from, where we are going, and how we ought to live, are deeply affected by our education and will determine (to a large degree) the future of many life forms on this planet.
    We also realize the importance of forming a large community centered on ecological issues and thus hope to create a forum where the diversity of ecological voices can be heard. Our hope is that TREES will eventually give birth to a journal that deals with the many ecological issues that we all must face. Likewise, we hope to create an on-line community where people can come to learn about the resources that different religions around the world have for dealing with the ecological crisis. We hope that this will be a place where ideas can be shared, information can be distributed, and actions can be promoted.
    Promoting actions that lead toward ways of life that promote the well being of all life on the planet is the main goal of the second part of our mission, viz. the Institutional/Physical-Structural.(2) This component focuses on connecting our ecological ways of thinking with ecological ways of living. The outcome of thought is action and we must change our institutions to reflect ecological ways of thinking. We must create institutions that promote the interrelated nature of all life on the planet.
    The Institutional/ Physical-Structural component will initially involve efforts to get participating GTU schools to perform environmental audits and then to move toward more sustainable methods of consumption and waste processing, including using renewable sources of energy. The current energy crisis in California provides us with more of an impetus and opportunity to move towards renewable energy. The short-term answer to the energy crisis is to build more oil, gas, and nuclear power plants. We hope that the GTU will consider the more ecological and long-term answers that are found in solar and wind technologies, conservation of energy, and ecological engineering and architecture. We hope to accomplish this goal through grant money and through the support of GTU faculty, staff, and students. Our hope is that by encouraging the GTU to lead the way in the "Ecological Reformation," we will inspire other educational institutions to take note and follow our lead.
    Affecting change in the larger educational, religious, Berkeley, bay area, regional, and earth communities is the third and final component of our mission, viz. the Communal/ Bioregional. This component, interconnected with the Educational/Philosophical and Institutional/Physical-Structural ones, will initially involve providing outreach and educational materials to specific communities of faith. These resources will introduce ways in which they, as religious organizations, might respond positively to the environmental crisis. We hope to begin a library that will include religion-specific, denomination-specific, and bioregion-specific information for religious leaders and communities that want to help mend the creation of which we are a part. Likewise, we want to provide communities with the help they need to make institutional and physical-structural changes that will promote the well being of all life forms on the planet. We want to teach others how we (as humans) can live respectfully with other life forms on the planet.
    The Communal/Bioregional aspect of our mission is our "message to the world." We hope that the changes that take place at the GTU will be a beacon for other communities to make changes. Our goal is nothing more than to start a reformation of the way we (as humans) live on this planet. Our strength comes from the individual TREES members experiences, insights, and gifts that have given rise to a community with a common, ecological purpose. In these our branches we gather light and nutrients in hopes that we will provide life for more members of the earth community. In the rich soil of our community we find meaning and seek to change the meaningless destruction of life that is going on all around us. We find hope in the larger visions that we share of an ecologically sound and just life for all. Finally, we find the sacred in the forest that will be revived through the efforts of groups like TREES and their cooperation with the Earths will to support life.
____________________________

* Whitney A. Bauman is Publications Assistant at the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences in Berkeley and Dana Spottswood works in Acquisitions at the Graduate Theological Union Library and serves as Publications coordinator for Piedmont Community Church in Piedmont, CA. Both Dana and Whitney are members of TREES.
|  BACK to TOP  |

1. Starr King, a Universal Unitarian institution, is one of the 9 member schools at the GTU.

2. Pacific School of Religion is another GTU member School.

If you would like more information about TREES, please contact us via email at: trees@gtu.edu or write to us at: TREES, The Graduate Theological Union, 2400 Ridge Road, Berkeley, CA 94709.

Close Window