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Praise for Paul

"A deep, prophetic, and generous voice that has for many years helped illuminate some of the most important intersections in this blessed and weary world."
Bill McKibben, author The End of Nature

H. Paul Santmire remains a foundational voice in ecotheology. For decades, he has provided in-depth scholarship on the Christian ecotheological tradition along with wise theological reflection. His clear, winsome explanations and compassionate challenges are a gift to people of faith and conscience. For those who long to find a faithful way through this historic moment of ecological crisis, Santmire continues to offer deep and delightful nourishment. Debra Rienstra Author of Refugia Faith: Seeking Hidden Shelters, Ordinary Wonders, and the Healing of the Earth

For over half a century, this wise prophetic man has inspired people the world over to embark on a sacred journey toward ecological healing.
Paul Santmire is a seminal thinker and wisdom figure in the world of eco-theology and environmental ethics. His brilliant work radiates with spiritual depth, fierce but gentle honesty, and transformative power.
Santmire is a humble hero, led by the Spirit, who offers his readers a feast of life. To him, I bow in gratitude.
Cynthia Moe-Lobeda
author of Building a Moral Economy, and other works in theological ethics

The field of Environmental Ethics stands on the shoulders of Paul Santmire, who recognized in the late 1960s that theology must play an essential role in addressing the ecological crisis. Now, 54 years after the publication of his landmark book Brother Earth - Nature, God and Ecology in Time of Crisis, his prophetic voice continues to bear witness with the release of The Earth and the Fullness Thereof.

Rev. Dr. Jim Antal, author of Climate Church, Climate World
https://www.jimantal.com/book , serves as Special Advisor on Climate Justice to the head of the United Church of Christ.

Paul Santmire wrote the first full-length study in eco-theology in 1970. As a study in St. Francis, it should probably have been by a Catholic scholar but was by a Lutheran one. And Paul hasn't stopped since...in a remarkable collection and contribution to Christian environmental ecology and ethics. For me personally, The Travail of Nature arrived at a pivotal moment. I was trying to assess my own Christian faith, its promise and its peril for the cause of planetary health. As an historian of Christian ethics that volume was never far from my desk as I drafted texts for seminary classes and church presentations. Nor was it far as I engaged in World Council of Churches work with a wide variety of global Christian traditions in the Justice, Peace, Creation unit. Furthermore, I'm certain my testimony about that volume would find parallels by other scholars and activists on other volumes by Paul. Well done, thou good and faithful servant! Larry Rasmussen Reinhold Niebuhr Professor Emeritus of Social Ethics at Union Theological Seminary, New York

Paul Santmire has stood as a, if not the, pioneering contemporary Christian eco-theologian, the one who for generations of thinkers opened the field of religion and ecology and invited the rest of us in. His work on how liturgy and spirituality shape ecological worldviews and, conversely, how ecological commitment and kinship can stretch and open spiritual practices in new ways has sparked my own thinking and writing for many years. Paul's vision has created space the tradition is still learning to inhabit, and he has also been a thoughtful, caring mentor and companion on the journey for me and countless others. I am profoundly grateful.
Lisa E. Dahill
Miriam Therese Winter Professor of Transformative Spirituality, Hartford International University

I had the benefit of knowing Paul Santmire over coffee before I ever read his work. While sage seminary professors, eager new preachers, and eco-activists in my midst were envious that I was going to meet up with their intellectual hero at a diner, my anxiety was ratcheted up as I figured this conversation may be out of my league. Before our mugs stopped steaming I realized I was in the midst of a great mind and a truly pastoral heart. His genuine desire to get to know fellow humans is similar to his approach to the truly open up and explore Scripture. When he asks you how you are, he really wants to know, it's not just a habitual phrase. His work to strengthen siblings in Christ in their connection to God through revering the created is a calling he lives out as an educator, pastor, leader and friend. The web of faith-based ecological work in the world is led by the light cast on this subject by Paul many years ago. And, anyone who has had the benefit of sharing a table with him can feel the light of his curiosity illuminate them as well.
Phoebe Morad, executive director of Lutherans Restoring Creation

Paul Santmire embodies the best of Lutheran theology, historical scholarship, and pastoral imagination- grounded in love for God's creation. With his trail-blazing ecological and sacramental insights Paul helps pastors preach the gospel for all creation.
I am grateful for Paul's work to advance the Season of Creation, and to champion Lutherans Restoring Creation. I always look forward to reading how he brings environmental lenses to open up biblical and Patristic texts in new ways. He inspires me as a scholar to keep studying and writing for the church.
Rev. Professor Barbara Rossing, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, author of The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation

McKibben

Rienstra

Moe-Lobeda

Antal

Rasmussen

Dahill

Morad

Rossing

2024-11-18

NEW The Earth and the Fullness Thereof: A downhome reader in ecological theology. H. Paul Santmire The background is a painting called “The Harvesters” by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. people working with scythes in a field.

book cover, abstract painting greens and blue, sense of a forest; text says: EcoActivist Testament: Faith Explorations for Fellow Travelers

Celebrating Nature by Faith: Studies in Reformation Theology in an Era of Global Emergency (2020)

Behold the Lilies

Before Nature

Ritualizing Nature

Nature Reborn

The Travail of Nature

Brother Earth

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