Creation Care Cohort
Event Details
A new ministry cohort of Grace Presbytery that seeks to coordinate, facilitate, and connect leaders in the creation care community.
Leaders: Bryan Smith, Seminary of the Wild
Miatta Wilson, Mission Associate for Christian Formation, PC(USA)
Clay Brantley, Parish Associate, Trinity Presbyterian Church, McKinney
Lil Smith, Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University
Reconnect with Creation – a cohort focused on our relationship with the earth
Are you yearning to reconnect with creation?
Do you sense a need to dig in the dirt?
Is nature a window into your relationship with God?
Perhaps it is time to take a walk in the wild and join the new Creation Care ministry cohort of Grace Presbytery that seeks to coordinate, facilitate and reconnect leaders in the creation care community. The rhythm of the cohort invites new discovery of “wild spirituality” for individuals, small groups, and congregations. There will be extensive “time on the land/in the wild” to digest these new discoveries. And, we will work together on a PDA project to put our discoveries into action.
As the plenary speaker, Bryan Smith, co-creator of Seminary of the Wild, will help us awaken to, and deepen into, our union with the natural world. His gentle invitations will guide our time on the land, as well.
Sarah Werner will be leading the Tuesday breakout session to share her experience leading a Wild Church. She will also be sharing spiritual practices from her upcoming book release: Rooted Faith: Practices for Living Well on a Fragile Planet. Sarah grew up in Grace Presbytery. We look forward to catching up and learning from her wild adventures.
The Wednesday breakout session will focus on Earth Care Congregations. You may already be in one or you may be interested in becoming one. Both topics will be addressed.
Dates: Monday, October 30th (4 pm check in) – Thursday, November 2nd (Depart after lunch)
Cost: $300 per person – However, the first 15 registrants pay only $100; remaining program costs underwritten by Congregations Support Committee grants and Grace Presbytery.
Breakout Topics
Earth Care Congregations (new and reconnecting)
Seminary of the Wild
Tentative Schedule: (Locations are weather permitting and subject to change)
Monday, October 30
4 pm Check in begins
6 pm Dinner
7 pm Opening Remarks, Music, Worship – Crane
Introductions
Cohort, Leaders, Speakers, Sacred Spaces
Tuesday, October 31
7:30 am Prayer at Lake Kilgore
8 am Breakfast
9 am Prayer and Music
9:30 am Plenary with Bryan Smith (via Zoom) – Crane
11 am Worship in the Wild
12 pm Lunch
1 pm Sarah Werner shares her journey with the wild and her new book
Rooted Faith: Practices for Living Well on a Fragile Planet. – Crane
3 pm Breakout Session – Earth Care Congregations (new and reconnecting) – Crane
5 pm Circle up at Sarah’s Spot for an afternoon check-in
6 pm Dinner
7pm Campfire and Connection
Wednesday, November 1
7:30 am Prayer at Open Air Tabernacle – walk the labyrinth
8 am Breakfast
9 am Prayer and Music
9:30 am Plenary #2 with Bryan Smith
11 am Worship in the Wild
12 pm Lunch
1 pm Breakout Session with Bryan Smith – Seminary of the Wild
3 pm PDA Project
5 pm Circle up at Chapel in the Sky for an afternoon check-in.
6 pm Dinner
7 pm Campfire and Connection
Thursday, November 2
8 am Breakfast
9 am Closing Remarks and Worship in the Wild – Lake Kilgore
12 pm Lunch and Depart
Bryan Smith
Seminary of the Wild
Bryan is truly passionate about working with people who yearn to take an inner, transformative journey into the realms of psyche, spirit, and soul so that they might discover what calling and genius the world needs from them in a time such as this. A central component of his work involves helping others to awaken to, and deepen into, their union with the natural world.
To this end, Bryan co-created Seminary of the Wild which has evolved into the Center for Wild Spirituality, where he serves as a guide. He is also an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church USA, an International Coaching Federation credentialed life coach, an Animas Valley Institute certified nature-based human development guide, a certified spiritual director, retreat leader, and an anti-racism trainer.
In preparation for the Creation Care Cohort, participants may wish to read Victoria Lourd’s book: Church of the Wild: How Nature Invites Us into the Sacred.
From Amazon
There will be opportunities to sign up for a compassionate listening session with Clay Brantley or Lil Smith
From the Back Cover
Editorial Reviews for Sarah Werner’s new book to be released in late September 2023
There is hope yet that we may embrace the call to live differently on this fragile planet.
As temperatures rise and natural disasters wreak devastation and precious species die off one by one, we know we must change how we live in the world. But how? What would it look like if we took seriously the biblical charge to live more peacefully and gently on our fragile planet, if we understood ourselves as neighbors in a community of creation? Rooted Faith explores the future of the church called to live differently–one of reinhabiting our particular landscapes and confronting the assumptions of consumer culture head-on through our lives and actions.
Drawing on Scripture, Christian history, and practical theology, author Sarah Werner invites readers into a new way of seeing ourselves in relationship with the rest of creation, offering tangible practices for opening up our hearts to both the beauty and tragedy around us and guiding us toward meaningful action to restore creation. There has never been a more crucial moment to reclaim this overlooked aspect of our faith as we seek to live differently–live well–on this fragile planet.
About the Author
Sarah Renee Werner is communications coordinator for Central District Conference of Mennonite Church USA and pastor of Olentangy Wild Church. She is also a professor of ecotheology with PATHWAYS, an online theological education program affiliated with the United Church of Christ, and lead course reviewer for the Environmental Justice Certificate Program, helping to develop a series of courses to help pastors, laypeople, and theology students confront environmental injustice in their local communities. She has served as guest editor for an environment-themed issue of Anabaptist Witness, and has written several articles for the journal, a publication of the Mennonite Mission Network, as well as for the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, the Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, and others.