On Ecology and Spirituality

Throughout history, seekers, shamans, and mystics have found spiritual inspiration in the natural world - in wild places at the margins of human culture. Indigenous, Native, and Aboriginal groups that have long identified immanent, animate power in plants, animals, and abiotic features of the landscape such as rivers, rocks, and cliffs.

In the 21st century, it is essential to reweave and reinvigorate spiritual connections with the landscape. Spiritual ecology encompasses the internal, subjective, emotional, mystical or religious connections between humans and the rest of planetary life. Through experiences in nature, people reconnect with that which is most essential, most alive, and most sustaining in their intimate connections with other beings, Earth, and the cosmos. This reconnection is as essential for sustaining life on an increasingly degraded planet, as it is for full human flourishing.

Join CIIS Associate Professor of Ecology, Spirituality, and Religion, Elizabeth Allison for an exploration into spiritual ecology. Discover how deepening our relationship with the natural world helps us thrive.

Elizabeth Allison, PhD is Associate Professor of Ecology, Spirituality, and Religion at California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, where Elizabeth founded and chairs the graduate program in Ecology, Spirituality, and Religion and created the Religion & Ecology Summit series of annual conferences. Elizabeth is co-editor of After the Death of Nature: Carolyn Merchant and the Future of Human-Nature Relations. Elizabeth's research and teaching explore connections between religion, ethics, and environmental practice, with particular attention to biodiversity, waste, ecological place, and climate change. Elizabeth's articles appear in journals including WIREs Climate Change, Mountain Research and Development, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, and in edited volumes on Bhutan, religion, nature, and geography.