2019 NAUTILUS GOLD WINNER
In a time of rapid climate change and species extinction, what role have the world-s religions played in ameliorating-or causing-the crisis we now face? Religion in general, and Christianity in particular, appears to bear a disproportionate burden for creating humankind-s exploitative attitudes toward nature through unearthly theologies that divorce human beings and their spiritual yearnings from their natural origins. In this regard, Christianity has become an otherworldly religion that views the natural world as -fallen,- as empty of signs of God-s presence.
And yet, buried deep within the Christian tradition are startling portrayals of God as the beaked and feathered Holy Spirit - the -animal God,- as it were, of historic Christian witness. Through biblical readings, historical theology, continental philosophy, and personal stories of sacred nature, this book recovers the model of God in Christianity as a creaturely, avian being who sign
