A Spirituality of Resistance: Finding a Peaceful Heart and Protecting the Earth

by Roger S. Gottlieb

With clarity, humor, detailed scholarship, and passionate eloquence, Roger S. Gottlieb uses a unique range of resources to portray a spiritual path keyed to caring for the earth.

This personal and powerful book speaks to anyone who has ever wondered how to be happy when there is so much suffering in the world-anyone who seeks a peaceful heart in a dark time. Its unique combination of spiritual insight, political commitment, and environmental knowledge reveals the deep ties between spiritual aspiration and ecological activism; and makes a critical contribution to both environmentalism and religious studies.

Gottlieb begins by describing the gifts which spirituality offers, and how those gifts cannot be realized if we flee into avoidance or denial in the face of ecological peril. In a startling and compelling comparison between the Holocaust and the environmental crisis, he shows how a psychic dependence on "work" can lead us-even against our wills-to take part in genocide or ecocide. Addressing questions about our obligations to the earth, he deepens our understanding of what it is to live an "environmentally correct" life and what we really mean by "nature." Finally, by connecting personal fulfillment to social activism, he shows how a truly peaceful heart is only possible if we devote some of our energies to resisting the forces of destruction.

Genres: Spirituality

224 pages, Paperback

First published March 25, 1999

About the author

I am a professor of philosophy at WPI and have written or edited 17 books, on subjects ranging from political philosophy and ethics to the Holocaust and disability. My major focus for the last twenty years has been the moral, political, spiritual and religious meaning of the environmental crisis; and the role of religion and spirituality in modern life.
I've described the rise of religious environmentalism ('A Greener Faith'); and asked what spirituality can look like in an age of environmental crisis('A Spirituality of Resistance'). I've also shown how progressive religion and social justice movements can help and learn from each other ('Joining Hands').

Recently, I turned to fiction in a collection of short stories: 'Engaging Voices: Tales of Morality and Meaning in an Age of Global Warming'. This book uses fictional settings to explore the moral, political, spiritual, and emotional meanings of the environmental crisis; and also asks what it would take for us to learn to listen to and learn from those with whom we disagree.

In January 2013 my latest book came out: 'Spirituality: What it Is and Why it Matters'. This book examines the promises and perils of spiritual life as understood both within and outside of traditional faiths, explains the rise of the widespread spiritual detachment from institutional religion, and offers searching accounts of yoga, meditation, and prayer. There are also insightful studies of spirituality's relation to modern medicine, nature and the environmental crisis, and political activism.

Both 'Engaging Voices' and 'Spirituality' won Nautilus Book Awards in 2013; and 'Spirituality' was also called a 'Best Book of the Year' by the Spirituality and Practice

Reviews

[Ellie Peddle · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was insightful and did offer some strong points about environmental activism and also provided a deeper understanding of why certain people commit evils. However, Gottlieb did dance around the point until he finally stressed what he was trying to say, and it was hard to follow at times. I do appreciate his love for nature and the earth and I think it has a deep message when you unpack everything he is teaching.

[David Haws · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had been impressed by Gottlieb’s description of the varied response to oppression (four classes of resistance/non-resistance) in an academic paper, and picked up this book as something that might give me a deeper insight into his system. He deals with the class of “self-deluded non-resistance,” when he discusses our dysfunctional attachment to the work that alienates us. This is the engineer (in the old joke) “fixing” the guillotine, which will soon lop off his own head. He didn’t get specifically into the “neurotic” response to oppression, which I found most interesting—and which I began seeing all around me—but this book is mostly about making resistance (particularly, resistance to ecocide) effective, so I really wasn’t expecting anything with this category (I guess the neurotic response would be to stop reading).

At times the prose descends a little too close to rant (he is a Marxist) but I agree that quietude is not an end in itself—we seek quietude to achieve clarity, and to focus our actions. This is the Latin (as opposed to the Greek) approach to stoicism.

[Drick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great book for thinking about spirituality in a different way. Gottlieb challenges us to connect our spirituality with the real world challenges of global climate change. He is critical of the emphasis on spirituality as a mean for finding personal peace in the midst of this crisis. He would rather we find that peace as we engage the major issues of poverty, injustice and ecological disaster. While at times he gets a little wordy, and his long chapters could have used some sub-headings to help the reader follow his thought, these minor problems do not take away from this deeply insightful and engaging book.

For further reflections on the insights he provides see my blog at http://drickboyd.blogspot.com/2010/07...