Because think about it: what is grace if not a benefit, a boon enjoyed, that's freely given - unearned, even undeserved? I think of this as I drive past the towering beeches that line our drive, past the pines between highway lanes, the older-than-our-nation oak just across from the airport here. Think about it: without our asking, without our paying for or otherwise earning it, these trees convert the CO2 from our cars into oxygen - oxygen we breathe, that we depend on for life itself. If that's not grace, I don't know what is. Grace, my friends, and the forgiveness of sins.

What happens if we imagine the Jesus of Christian theology to be realized in the nonhuman natural world around us? Basic to Christian belief is the notion that God, the creator of all, inhabited the earth in order to call to us. God of Earth embraces this central premise of Christianity - Jesus as both fully divine and fully human - and then allows for the possibility that such a Jesus need not be limited to a human man. What if Jesus were "God of earth" - not only over earth but also in and through it? As Swenson tracks that question through the cycle of a church year, she invites readers to reconsider our relationship to the nonhuman natural world and so experience new dimensions of the sacred and new possibilities for hope and healing.

A lapsed churchgoer of a questionable Christianity, I nevertheless remain captivated by the implications of Jesus. I cannot shake the sense that the premise at the heart of Christianity is rich in ways as yet unplumbed and profoundly relevant for our time. I look around at the world as it is, caring about the world as it is, and wonder if the Jesus of Christian theology just might be bigger than the Middle Eastern man from two thousand years ago.

I was born, raised, and still identify myself as a Christian; and for as long as I can remember, I’ve been passionate about the health and welfare of the nonhuman natural world. Over the years, both general characteristics—my Christianity and environmentalism—have taken on all sorts of nuance, from embarrassment over what frequently stands for “Christian” and attendant religion envy (Buddhism is so cool, and Jewish ritual rocks), to appreciating how sophisticated our interactions with the nonhuman natural world must be in order to do the least harm.

I’ve come to agree with Jane Goodall, who said, “How sad that so many people seem to think that science and religion are mutually exclusive.”[i] And with Wendell Berry that “perhaps the great disaster of human history is one that happened to or within religion: that is, the conceptual division between the holy and the world, the excerpting of the Creator from the creation.”[ii] So to state this project in another way: I see hints of ways within the religion I inherited to put things together again—the holy and the world, Creator and creation.

[i] Jane Goodall, "In the Forests of Gombe," in The Best American Science and Nature Writing, ed. Edward O. Wilson (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2001), 51.

[ii] Wendell Berry, A Continuous Harmony: Essays Cultural and Agricultural (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1970), 6.

-- from the Introduction

What if Jesus, the incarnation of a universal and eternal God who desires reconciliation and fullness of life, is also present and alive with us today, in and through this pulsing blue-green planet Earth? What does it mean for the ever-living God of all to become flesh that we might be reconciled to her? What if among the ways that a person might meet the incarnate God, know divine love, and experience deepest forgiveness is in relationship to the nonhuman natural world?

I propose taking Christian claims seriously—but in a new way, to come at it all quite differently. What if Jesus, from before the man from Galilee and still today, were God of earth—both “over” (like Elizabeth is Queen of England) and “constituted by,” (like chocolate is of cocoa)—and all the while, at the same time, God?

That’s what drives this book—a nagging question that I’ve chased over field and stream and, once snared in my flimsy net, subjected to an experiment of the imagination. Indeed, for all that the effort might sound at first like some complicated intellectual exercise, or academic systematics, it’s not. On the contrary, it’s the chronicle of a question.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, this isn’t a head trip; it’s a journey of the heart.

So, it’s also an invitation—an invitation of imagination. The implications are both ecological and personal as they blow past petrified traditions to embrace fresh questions of what Christianity might mean and be in our time.

For what is the whole Jesus-thing if not God’s being of and in the material, blood, bone, and breath of it all? What is it if not a declaration of love beyond knowing for the eternal, universal Creator to take on skin and limbs and friends and grief in order to reconcile this blue-green home of ours to heaven? And what is that reconciling if not a repair that accepts the truth of our brokenness and throws a lifeline that we may grope our way toward wholeness? It’s a complicated business, with weighty responsibility and a not-altogether-certain outcome, but there it is. Comfort, inspiration, and, dare I say, the possibility of hope.

--from the Introduction

"The natural world is full of stories with important lessons, Swenson insists... With a poetic and serene tone, she beckons readers to listen." Publishers Weekly

"Stunningly beautiful," and "with a good deal of humor" "Swenson suggests a subtle shift [concerning the Incarnation]... that reverberates through the entire tradition"  - Englewood Review of Books (feature review)

"Wonderfully penned meditations on the most basic questions Christianity -- and humanity -- now face. The writing stirs, the reflections inspire."
—Larry Rasmussen, Reinhold Niebuhr professor emeritus of social ethics (Union Theological Seminary, New York City), author of Earth-Honoring Faith: Religious Ethics in a New Key

"Kristin Swenson invites us to gentle perceptive meditation on the place where we live. She offers a 'theology of creation' informed by a rich appeal to religious mystery, voiced in poetic imagery and cadence. Readers are offered thick attentiveness to the world in front of us.”
—Walter Brueggemann, William Marcellus McPheeters professor emeritus of Old Testament (Columbia Theological Seminary), author of God, Neighbor, Empire: The Excess of Divine Fidelity and the Command of Common Good

"From the intersection of vast scholarly knowledge, deeply personal life experience, and Christian tradition, Swenson coaxes fresh truths and wisdom for all of us seeking a faith that honors the world. Wonderfully engaging, God of Earth motivates and empowers readers to stretch ideas of God as they care, in love and awe, for the earth."
—Rev. Pat Watkins, United Methodist Missionary for the Care of God's Creation

"Seeker and visionary biblical scholar, Kristin Swenson blows past petrified Christian traditions to shine light on a profoundly radical new way to experience God"
—Stephanie Pearson, contributing editor, Outside magazine

"Kristin Swenson’s God of Earth is a daring experiment to find a new vocabulary for Christian life and thought in the very depths of the life of earth itself. She finds a “Jesus beyond Jesus” incarnate in the very stuff of our planet, and calls us to heal and be healed by attending to that very illumination. Merging her own intimate and moving experiences in nature to the ancient traditions of Christianity and its church-year, she creates a pathway for our pilgrimage toward a new way of seeing and living with faith on planet earth. Words of wisdom by a rich array of scientists, theologians, and poets flow together with her own intimate experiences of nature to provide inspiration and direction. Her own expertise as a biblical scholar and her fresh and poetic language allow us to share the surprises of her discoveries and her passion for a life of caring for earth and our fellow creatures."
—Cliff Edwards, professor of religious studies (Virginia Commonwealth University), author of Van Gogh and God: A Creative Spiritual Quest