Tucker/Grim R&E Webinars

Center on Modernity in Transition (COMIT) Co-Director Shahrzad Sabet sat down with Mary Evelyn Tucker and Norman Wirzba to discuss how the idea of oneness might shape our understanding of and relationship to ecology.

This online event, which took place on February 21, 2024, featured author Ellen Bass and was moderated by Mary Evelyn Tucker. The event centered on a dialogue around the poetic dimensions of forests, including how the old growth forests near Ellen Bass’s home in Santa Cruz have inspired her own work, and how poetry as a genre can help give form to the many socio-cultural meanings of the forest. This event was sponsored by Orion Magazine, the Forest School at Yale, and the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology.

Join our inspiring conversation with Dr. Mary Evelyn Tucker: Confucian scholar and global leader in religious responses to ecological issues. She is the co-founder of the Forum on Religion and Ecology and the Journey of the Universe projects, as well as involvement with The Earth Charter initiatives. Dr. Tucker is a renowned leader, teacher, and author, and has led and supported international religious and ethical responses to ecological concerns. We will learn about Mary Evelyn’s story and how it connects to the universe’s story, as she invites us to understand and embody our deep interconnectedness in a new way. Heather Eaton will interview her long-time colleague, and friend, Dr. Mary Evelyn Tucker. The series “Being a Leader: Lunchtime Conversations” offers opportunities to reflect with organizational and community leaders upon the challenges of social transformation in a complex world, and to better appreciate the resources we can rely on to act within this complex world. Organized by the School of Leadership, Ecology and Equity, Saint Paul University. This event took place on February 6, 2024. 

In this Deep Transformative Network webinar, Jeremy Lent led a conversation with Jinfeng Zhou and Mary Evelyn Tucker exploring themes from Freya Mathews' groundbreaking book The Dao of Civilization. In the first half, Jeremy Lent discussed with Jinfeng Zhou, the prominent Chinese ecological campaigner, how the intersection of traditional Chinese values and technology shows up in the modern world, and specifically within China. In the second half, along with the rich questions and reflections shared, we were joined by Mary Evelyn Tucker, one of the world's leading scholars on the intersection of religion and ecology, and co-founder with her partner John Grim of the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology. This event took place on July 25, 2023.

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Dialogue with Ursula Goodenough, Professor of Biology Emerita, Washington University and Carol Wayne White, Interim Director of the Griot Center (2022-23) and Professor of Philosophy of Religion, Bucknell University. Moderated by Mary Evelyn Tucker, Co-founder and Co-director, Forum on Religion and Ecology, Yale University. This event is part of the Eco Justice for All Dialogue Series hosted by the Temple of Understanding.

In this time of critical call to personal and global transformation, what is the role and value of religion? Religion to the Rescue is an initiative of UNITY EARTH–a global network on a mission to accelerate the realization of unity and peace on Earth. Religion to the Rescue is a series of Zoomcasts in which leading spiritual and religious thought-leaders and activists will be interviewed. The overall aim is to explore how we can come together to respond to current crises–and to reflect on the role of religion in doing so. These discussions will cover a wide variety of topics. Program hosts are Ben Bowler and Patrick Carolan. This event was streamed live on November 18, 2022. 

Evenings with an Author hosted scholars Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim in conversation with Alice McCrum. Frequently placed in opposition to one another, the union of religion and science may be a vital strategic move in the fight against the climate crisis. What can world religions teach us about the earth? How does religion express our relationship to nature, and how can we use religious philosophy to mitigate nature’s destruction? Yale historians of religion Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim speak on their work, Ecology and Religion. Posing the question, “what is religious ecology?”, the book shows how global religions and environmental practices intersect in ways both obvious and surprising. Ultimately, Tucker and Grim propose that religion can contribute an ethical and spiritual dimension to ecology, motivating the fight for climate justice. In this conversation, they discuss ways of thinking about the natural world, ways of engaging with it, and ways of changing it for the better. This event took place on November 9, 2022.

The Forest School at the Yale School of the Environment, Orion Magazine, and the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology present the third event in a series to celebrate Orion’s latest anthology, Old Growth. “The Language of Trees” features a conversation between Alison Hawthorne Deming, author of Zoologies: On Animals and the Human Spirit, and Kathleen Dean Moore, author of Earth’s Wild Music: Celebrating and Defending the Songs of the Natural World. The event fosters a dialogue around the language of trees: how they communicate with one another, and how their futures are shaped by the language with which humans describe them. Moderating the event is Mary Evelyn Tucker, co-author of Journey of the Universe and co-founder of Yale’s Forum on Religion and Ecology.

The growing ecological crisis clearly requires the response of science and technology, economics, and policy. These are necessary but not sufficient for solving the complex problems we are facing in envisioning a sustainable future for the Earth community. We will also need the participation of the world’s religious communities as we recognize the moral and spiritual implications of the diminishing life support systems of the planet. This talk will highlight some of the remarkable work being done within religious communities around the world to bring healing and restoration to people and land. While acknowledging the limitations of religions it will also note the promise for ethical and spiritual transformation regarding ecological attitudes and practices. This will be explored further in the new Yale/Coursera online classes are designed for a general audience.

In August 2021, Orion Magazine released Old Growth, an anthology of essays and poems about the lives of trees. To celebrate the release of the book, the Forest School at the Yale School of the Environment, Orion Magazine, and the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology are hosting a public discussion with Robin Wall Kimmerer, Robert Macfarlane, David Haskell, and Mary Evelyn Tucker. Together, they will discuss the idea of the personhood of trees, root communities, and the ways in which humans might foster the growth of our canopy.

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We face major sustainability challenges in the 21st Century. Fortunately, we have a unique opportunity to implement solutions at a global scale. The UN Sustainable Development Goals are a rallying point, and Faith Based Organizations are working on a host of activities across multiple SDGs, including conserving nature, scaling renewable energy, providing access to clean water, and returning land to Indigenous management. The Parliament of the World's Religions, UNEP Faith for Earth, United Religions Initiative, and the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology launch the “Faith Action on the UN Sustainable Development Goals” project, a living, evolving, searchable database featuring faith-based organizations around the world doing work within the scope of the environmental SDGs.

Hosted by Voices for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons Youth Team, this webinar with Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim is moderated by Kehkashan Basu. This event took place on April 8, 2021. 

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We live in a time of enormous upheaval and we yearn to bring our creativity to bear for transformative change. This webinar will suggest some ways forward in the midst of complex social, political, and ecological challenges. How can we draw on the world's religions for a more comprehensive view of an ecological ethics and ecojustice?
And how can this help us develop a broader environmental and cosmic consciousness. This event took place on February 4, 2021. 

In this episode of Spotlights, Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim talk with the host (Sam Mickey) about the new encyclical from Pope Francis, Fratelli Tutti. They provide historical, religious, and ecological context for understanding what this encyclical means and how it is relevant for efforts to create a more loving, just, and open world. Posted 10/19/2020.

Speakers: Mary Evelyn Tucker, Meijun Fan, and Karenna Gore; Moderator: Andrew Schwartz. This Webinar was organized as a collaborative effort between the Earth Charter International, University for Peace, Pace Center for Green Sci-Teck and Development, the Institute of Ecological Civilization, China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation (CBCGDF), and the Center for Process Studies.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a global crisis of unprecedented scale, with aftershocks that will be felt in virtually every aspect of life for years or decades to come. The Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future at the Pardee School of Global Studies has launched a new video series called “The World After Coronavirus,” in which we ask leading experts and practitioners from Boston University and across the world to explore the challenges and opportunities we will face in our post-coronavirus future. The series is hosted by Prof. Adil Najam, the Inaugural Dean of the Pardee School of Global Studies and former Director of the Pardee Center. In this episode, Dean Najam speaks with Mary Evelyn Tucker, Co-founder and Co-director of the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology, about the future of religion and ecology after COVID-19.

Streamed live on May 19, 2020 as part of Laudato Si' Week.