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The second annual Thomas Berry Award and
Lecture took place on Friday evening October 8th at
the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Cambridge,
Massachusetts.
This event, sponsored by the Center for
Respect of Life and Environment (CRLE)1
and hosted by the Forum on Religion and Ecology, celebrated
the life and work of Thomas Berry, one of the foremost
thinkers in revisioning human-earth relations for a
more humane and sustainable future for all life on the
planet. This year’s award recipient and lecturer
was Brian Swimme, a leading mathematical cosmologist.
Swimme received his Ph.D. from the University of Oregon
in 1978, specializing in gravitational dynamics, mathematical
cosmology, and singularity theory. He then taught in
the Department of Mathematics at the University of Puget
Sound from 1978–1981.
In 1981 Swimme moved to New York to study with Thomas
Berry at his Riverdale Center of Religious Research.
Thus began their collaboration on research into the
evolutionary dynamics of the universe, earth, life,
and role of the human within the earth community. In
1992 they co-authored The Universe Story.
Swimme returned to teaching in 1983 as an assistant
professor at Holy Names College in Oakland, California.
His work on the “new cosmology” or “the
new story of the universe” generated excitement
and creativity for many who discovered the universe
story as our story.
In 1989, Swimme founded the Center for the Story of
the Universe at the California Institute of Integral
Studies (CIIS) in San Francisco. For ten years, the
Center has carried out research, sponsored conferences,
and produced and distributed video and audio programs.
In 1994, Swimme joined the graduate faculty of CIIS
as a professor of cosmology.
Swimme has been a featured speaker at conferences sponsored
by the American Association for the Advancement of Science,
The United Nations, The World Bank, UNESCO, State of
the World Forum, and the International Montessori Association.
His published work includes: The Universe is a Green
Dragon, and, with Thomas Berry, The Hidden Heart
of the Cosmos. Swimme has three video series to
his credit, Canticle to the Cosmos, The Hidden
Heart of the Cosmos, and, his most recent video
series, The Earth’s Imagination, which explores
the evolutionary nature of the human mind its participation
in the shaping of a vibrant Earth community.
Also participating in the event was musician Paul Winter,
who performed in honor of Thomas Berry. Winter has performed
in many parts of the world and has recorded numerous
CDs and records. For the past twenty years he has been
conducting celebrations inspired by the work of Thomas
Berry and Brian Swimme at the Cathedral of St. John
the Divine. These performances include the annual Earth
Mass in October for the feast of St. Francis as well
as the Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox celebrations.
Winter is also a member of the original Board of Directors
of the Center for Respect of Life and Environment.
This event marked an occasion of unique importance
in the development of the epic of evolution as a primary
context for situating the role of the human in the next
millennium. The epic of evolution is a story which reinvigorates
our sense of wonder and awe in relation to the unfolding
of our planet and the larger universe. Renewing our
deep connectedness to the earth is the aim of this “new
story” which Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme have
developed, inspired in part by the thought of Pierre
Teilhard de Chardin. At this occasion three important
publications were celebrated: a new translation by Sarah
Weber of the principal work of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,
The Human Phenomenon, a new collection of essays
by Thomas Berry entitled, The Great Work, and
Brian Swimme’s four part video series on Earth’s
Imagination.
We also celebrated the announcement of the transfer
of Thomas Berry’s archives to Harvard University
as part of the Environmental Science and Public Policy
Archive. This Archive is intended to document the work
of key thinkers who have highlighted and helped to shape
the fundamental changes in the late twentieth century
regarding the relationship of humans to the natural
world.
| Reception |
6:00–7:15 |
Announcement of
Thomas Berry Archive |
7:15 |
Award Presentation and Lecture
by Brian Swimme |
7:30 |
| Music by Paul Winter |
8:30 |
From his academic beginning as a cultural
historian, Thomas Berry has evolved over the last thirty
years to become a historian of the earth. He sees himself
not as a theologian but as a geologian. The movement
from human history to cosmological history has been
a necessary progression for Berry. In his own lifetime
he has witnessed the emergence of a planetary civilization
as cultures have come in contact around the globe, often
for the first time. At the same time, the very resources
for sustaining such a planetary civilization are being
undermined by massive environmental destruction.
Thomas Berry began his academic career
as a historian of Western intellectual history. His
thesis at Catholic University on Giambattista Vico’s
philosophy of history was published in 1951. Vico was
trying to establish a science of the study of nations
comparable to what others had done for the study of
nature.
Influenced by Vico, Berry has developed
a comprehensive historical perspective in periodization,
an understanding of the depths of contemporary barbarism,
and the need for a new mythic wisdom to extract ourselves
from our cultural pathology and deep alienation. Berry
has described contemporary alienation as especially
pervasive due to the power of the technological trance,
the myth of progress, and our own autism in relation
to nature. With the New Story and the Dream
of the Earth, Berry hopes to overcome this alienation
and evoke the energies needed to create a viable and
sustainable future. He calls this effort to create a
new basis for human-earth relations, the “Great
Work.”
When Berry set out for China in 1948,
he met William Theodore de Bary on the boat leaving
from San Francisco. De Bary was on his way to China
as the first Fulbright scholar of Chinese studies. Berry
intended to study language and Chinese philosophy in
Beijing. Their time in China, while fruitful, was cut
short by Mao’s Communist victory in 1949. After
they returned to the States they worked together to
found the Asian Thought and Religion Seminar at Columbia
University.
Berry taught Asian religions at Seton
Hall (1956–1960) and St. John’s University
(1960–1966) and eventually moved to Fordham University
(1966–1979). Berry founded a Ph.D. program in the
History of Religions at Fordham and wrote numerous articles
on Asian religions in addition to two books, one on
Buddhism (1966) and the other on Religions
of India (1971). Originally published by Anima Press,
both are now distributed by Columbia University Press.
What distinguished Berry’s approach
to religion was his effort not only to discuss the historical
unfolding of the traditions being studied, but also
to articulate their spiritual dynamics and contemporary
significance. Equally important in Berry’s approach
has been his balanced effort to highlight the distinctive
contributions of both the Western traditions and the
Asian religions. In addition, he has shown a long-standing
appreciation for the spirituality of indigenous traditions
in both Asia and the Americas.
In a short monograph published in 1968,
Berry demonstrates the originality of his interpretations
of the spiritual dynamics of Asian religious thought.
Titled, “Five Oriental Philosophies,” this
monograph describes the phenomenological essence of
these traditions as well as their historical unfolding.
He includes Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism,
and Zen in his discussions.
Berry has been able to appreciate the
deep spiritual impulses and devastating human sorrows
which have given rise to the world’s religions.
From this perspective he has discerned which spiritual
resources are needed to create a comprehensive multicultural
perspective within the earth community. For Berry, tolerance
of diversity of religious ideas is comparable to protecting
the diversity of species in the natural world; human
diversity and biological diversity are two aspects of
a vital ecological whole.
Confucianism has had special significance
for Berry because of its cosmological concerns, its
interest in self-cultivation and education, and its
commitment to improve the social and political order.
With regard to Confucian cosmology, Berry has identified
the important understanding of the human as a microcosm
of the cosmos. Essential to this cosmology is a “continuity
of being” and thus a “communion” between
various levels of reality-cosmic, social, and personal-similar
to the ideas of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Alfred North
Whitehead, and other contemporary process thinkers.
In addition to a remarkable ability to
appreciate the diversity and uniqueness of the great
world religions, Berry has a lively interest in and
empathy for native religions. His own research, writing,
and teaching in the field of Native America religions
has been extensive. Berry’s appreciation for native
tradition and for the richness of their mythic, symbolic,
and ritual life has been enhanced by his encounters
with the ideas of Carl Jung and Mircea Eliade. Jung’s
understanding of the collective unconscious, his reflections
on the power of archetypal symbols, and his sensitivity
to religious processes has made him an important influence
on Berry’s thinking. Moreover, Mircea Eliade’s
studies in the history of religions have been enormously
useful in Berry’s understanding of both Asian and
native traditions. This is due in large part to Eliade’s
ability to interpret broad patterns of meaning embedded
in comparable symbols and rituals across cultures.
Within this larger framework of interpretive
categories, Berry is able to articulate the special
feeling in native traditions for the sacredness of the
land, the seasons, and the animal, bird, and fish life.
Native peoples respect creation because they respect
the Creator. They have a deep reverence for the gift
of all life and for human dependency on nature to sustain
life. They have perfected some of the ancient techniques
of shamanism (i.e., utilizing ritual fasting and prayer
to call on the powers in nature for personal healing
and communal strength). They have cultivated an ability
to use resources without abusing them and to recognize
the importance of living lightly on the earth. This
is not to suggest that native peoples were the ideal
ecologists. As in the Chinese case, abuses certainly
have occurred. However, for Berry these two traditions
(Confucianism and Native American religions) remain
central to the creation of a new ecological spirituality
for our times.
In formulating his idea of the “New
Story,” Berry is much indebted to the thought of
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. In particular, Berry has
derived, from Teilhard and other writers such as Loren
Eiseley, an enormous appreciation for developmental
time. As Berry writes frequently, since Charles Darwin’s,
Origin of Species, we have become aware of the
universe not simply as a static cosmos but as an unfolding
cosmogenesis. The theory of evolution provides a distinctive
realization of change and development in the universe
that resituates us in a huge sweep of geological time.
With regard to developmental time, Teilhard suggested
that the whole perspective of evolution changes our
understanding of ourselves in the universe. For Berry,
the New Story is the primary context for understanding
the immensity of cosmogenesis. It is similar to what
Loren Eiseley refers to as “The Immense Journey”
or “The Firmament of Time.”
From Teilhard, Berry has also derived
an understanding of the psychic-physical character of
the unfolding universe. This implies that if there is
consciousness in the human and if humans have evolved
from the earth, then from the beginning some form of
consciousness or interiority is present in the process
of evolution. Matter, for both Teilhard and Berry, is
not simply dead or inert, but a numinous reality consisting
of both physical and spiritual dimensions. Consciousness,
then, is an intrinsic part of reality and is the thread
that links all life-forms. There are various forms of
consciousness and, in the human, self-consciousness
or reflective thought arises. This implies for Berry
that we are one species among others and as self-reflective
beings we need to understand our particular responsibility
for the continuation of the evolutionary process. We
have reached a juncture where we are realizing that
we will determine which life-forms survive and which
will become extinct. We have become co-creators as we
have become conscious of our role in this extraordinary,
irreversible, developmental sequence of the emergence
of life-forms.
Berry’s approach has been much more
inclusive in terms of cultural history and religion
while Teilhard’s has been remarkably comprehensive
scientifically. These two approaches have come together
in Berry’s collaborative effort with mathematical
cosmologist Brian Swimme entitled, The Universe Story.
Here for the first time is the narration of the story
of the evolution of the solar system and the earth along
with the story of the evolution of homo sapiens and
human cultures and societies. While not claiming to
definitive or exhaustive, The Universe Story
sets forth a model for the telling of a common creation
story. It marks a new era of self-reflection for humans,
one that Berry has described as the “ecological
age” or the beginning of the “ecozoic age.”
Berry’s ideas on the New Story began
in the early 1970s as he pondered the magnitude of the
social, political, and economic problems we were facing
the human community. He first published the “New
Story” in 1978 as the initial booklet of the Teilhard
Studies series.
Berry opens his essay by observing, “We
are in between stories.” He notes how the old story
was functional because “It shaped our emotional
attitudes, provided is with life purpose, and energized
action. It consecrated suffering, integrated knowledge,
and guided education.” This context of meaning
provided by the old stories is no longer operative.
Berry proposes a new story of how things came to be,
where we are now, and how our human future can be given
some meaningful direction. In losing our direction we
have not lost our values and orientation for human action.
This is what the New Story can provide.
Berry states that to communicate values
within this new frame of reference (the earth story)
we need to identify the basic principles of the universe
process itself. These are the primordial intentions
of the universe toward differentiation, subjectivity,
and communion.
Differentiation refers to the extraordinary
variety and distinctiveness of everything in the universe.
No two things are completely alike. Subjectivity or
consciousness is the interior numinous component present
in all reality. Communion is the ability to relate to
other people and things due to the presence of subjectivity
and difference. Together these create the grounds for
the inner attraction of things for one another. These
are principles that can become the basis of a more comprehensive
ecological and social ethics that see the human community
as dependent upon and interactive with the earth community.
Only such a perspective can result in the survival of
both humans and the earth. As Berry has stated, humans
and the earth will go into the future as one single
multiform event or we will not go into the future at
all.
This New Story is born out of Berry’s
own intellectual formation as a Western cultural historian,
turning toward Asian religions, examining indigenous
traditions, and finally culminating in the study of
the scientific story of the universe itself. It is a
story of personal evolution against the background of
cosmic evolution. It is the story of one person’s
intellectual journey in relation to an Earth history.
It is the story of all of our histories in conjunction
with planetary history. It is a story awaiting new tellings,
new chapters, and ever-deeper confidence in the beauty
and mystery of its unfolding. It is this story which
provides a comprehensive context for orienting human
life toward the “Great Work” of our time.
As Berry suggests, history calls us in the late twentieth
century to create new, life sustaining human-earth relations.
The life, beauty, and diversity of the planet need to
be preserved and enhanced for future generations. This
is the Great Work to which we are each called by Thomas
Berry.
1
The Center for Respect of Life and Environment (CRLE),
an affiliate of The Human Society of the United States
(HSUS), was founded in 1986 to foster an ethic of compassion
toward all sentient beings and respect for the integrity
of nature. CRLE seeks to clarify and promote the ethical,
intellectual, and practical foundations for a global
humane society and a sustainable future. They pursue
four major program goals:
- Religion and Ecology supports the ecological reform
of world religions, promoting those beliefs and practices
in each tradition which contribute to a viable and
vibrant earth.
- Creating Global Earth Ethics promotes ecocentric
ethics and values that will help to guide development
policies and professional practices.
- Sustainable Livelihoods in Sustainable Communities
encourage lifestyles as well as economic and social
policies that enhance the social, spiritual, and ecological
well-being of life.
- Greening Academia, through University Leaders for
a Sustainable Future, seeks to transform college and
university operations, curricula, research, and outreach
that embodies/teaches sustainability.
Thomas Berry has served on the board of
CRLE since 1988 and is the HSUS Scholar-in-Residence.
He received the HSUS James Herriot Award in 1992 in
recognition of the contributions of his thoughts to
growing public appreciation of and concern for the animals
of this world. He is a friend and mentor to all those
involved in the HSUS family of organizations.
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2
Thomas Berry received his Ph.D. from the Catholic University
of America in European intellectual history with a thesis
on Giambattista Vico. Widely read in Western history
and theology, he also spent many years studying and
teaching the cultures and religions of Asia. He has
lived in China and traveled to other parts of Asia.
He has authored two books on Asian religions, Buddhism
and Religions of India, both of which are distributed
by Columbia University Press. For more than twenty years,
he directed the Riverdale Center of Religious Research
along the Hudson River. During this period he taught
at Fordham University where he chaired the history of
religions program and directed twenty-five doctoral
theses. His major contributions to the discussions on
the environment are his books: The Dream of the Earth
(Sierra Club Books, 1988), with Brian Swimme, The
Universe Story (Harper San Francisco, 1992), and
his latest book, The Great Work: Our Way into the
Future (Random House/Bell Towers, 1999).
Return to text
Copyright © 1999 Mary
Evelyn Tucker.
Reprinted with permission.
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