Reflections on nature, culture & the inner life
Dear New School Friends: The great writer and naturalist Barry Lopez participated in a Commonweal retreat a few years before he died. That is where I came to know him. On May 31, Ben Ehrenreich, himself a great writer and naturalist, published this New York Times...
Dear Friends: We live in an intensely dangerous period of time–for ourselves and for the world. The turbulence continues to accelerate. This is the polycrisis–the quickening interaction of environmental, social, technological and economic stressors–leading to...
Dear Friends: This morning at 8 a.m., four of us from Commonweal went down to Agate Beach in Bolinas. We went to visit an extraordinary whale rib that had washed up with the tide. I estimate the rib is about twelve feet long and as thick as my thigh. Since it is only...
Dear Friends: This essay, or working paper, is my latest effort to explore how we may live as best we can in the global polycrisis that we have entered. I use the terms global polycrisis and polycrisis throughout this working paper. But I hold no special brief for...
Dear New School Friends: No doubt you have noticed the world is in disarray. No doubt COVID has affected your life. No doubt the signs of war and climate change and political strife weigh upon you. Tonight, as I reflected on what i might say to you, an inner voice...
Dear TNS Friends: Thanks to so many of you for supporting The New School this giving season. We are so grateful. If you didn’t get around to making a contribution, no worries! Just make your contribution here. Start the new year supporting our unique approach to...