Spiritual Ecology Quotes

“The world is not a problem to be solved; it is a living being to which we belong. The world is part of our own self and we are a part of its suffering wholeness. Until we go to the root of our image of separateness, there can be no healing. And the deepest part of our separateness from creation lies in our forgetfulness of its sacred nature, which is also our own sacred nature.”
― Thích Nhất Hạnh, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“How can we speak about sustainability without speaking about the Sustainer?”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“First we have to step out of our dream of separation, the insularity with which we have imprisoned ourselves, and acknowledge that we are a part of a multidimensional living spiritual being we call the world. The world is much more than just the physical world we perceive through the senses, just as we are much more than just our own physical bodies. Only as a part of a living whole can we help to heal the whole. Just as we need to work together with the outer ecosystem, we need to work together with the inner worlds. We need their support and help, their power and knowledge. The devas understand the patterns of climate change better than we do, because they are the forces behind the weather and the winds. Just as plant devas know the healing powers of plants (and taught the shamans and healers their knowledge), so are there more powerful devas that know and guide the patterns of evolution of the whole planet.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“We are talking only to ourselves. We are not talking to the rivers, we are not listening to the wind and stars. We have broken the great conversation. By breaking that conversation we have shattered the universe. All the disasters that are happening now are a consequence of that spiritual “autism.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“Our separation from the natural world may have given us the fruits of technology and science, but it has left us bereft of any instinctual connection to the spiritual dimension of life—the connection between our soul and the soul of the world, the knowing that we are all part of one living, spiritual being.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“When we first arrived as settlers, we saw ourselves as the most religious of peoples, as the most free in our political traditions, the most learned in our universities, the most competent in our technologies, and most prepared to exploit every economic advantage. We saw ourselves as a divine blessing for this continent. In reality, we were a predator people on an innocent continent.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“To reclaim our dignity and role as guardians of the planet will not be easy. But we can pray for the intercession of His mercy, knowing, according to an ancient promise, that “His mercy is greater than His justice.” There is a real reason that the ancients understood that He is a wrathful God, and made penance and sacrifice to placate Him. We may think that our science and civilization can protect us from this primal power, but the symbol of the dragon as the power of the earth is not without meaning. We have little understanding of the archetypal forces that underlie our surface lives, and of how they are all interconnected and can manifest the will of God. We can no longer afford to be ignorant or think that we can abuse the world as long as we want.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“The world is not a problem to be solved; it is a living being to which we belong. The world is part of our own self and we are a part of its suffering wholeness. Until we go to the root of our image of separateness, there can be no healing. And the deepest part of our separateness from creation lies in”
― Thích Nhất Hạnh, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“By human soul, I mean an individual person’s ultimate place in the more-than-human world—his or her place in the Earth community, not just in a human society.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“He replied, “I try to remember that it’s not me, John Seed, trying to protect the rain forest. Rather, I am part of the rain forest protecting itself. I am that part of the rain forest recently emerged into human thinking.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“The world is not a problem to be solved; it is a living being to which we belong. The world is part of our own self and we are a part of its suffering wholeness. Until we go to the root of our image of separateness, there can be no healing. And the deepest part of our separateness from creation lies in our forgetfulness of its sacred nature, which is also our own sacred nature.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“By “developing” the planet, we have been reducing Earth to a new type of barrenness.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a world that honors the servant, but has forgotten the gift. —ALBERT EINSTEIN”
― Hanh Nhat Thich, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“Like ether, let us remain undivided and not become narrow and unyielding. Like the earth, let us help and share the burden of all. Like the water, let us flow untethered and quench the deepest thirst. Like fire, let us eliminate the unnecessary and unimportant. Like air, let us silently become a lifeline for all.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“The Enlightenment values of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are being reconfigured. Life now includes the larger life of the earth, individual freedom requires responsibility to community, and happiness is being defined as more than material goods.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“If six degrees centigrade of global warming takes place, 95% of species will die out, including Homo sapiens. Mass extinction has already happened five times and this is the sixth. According to the Buddhist tradition there is no birth and no death—after extinction things will appear in other forms. So you have to breathe very deeply in order to acknowledge the fact that we humans may disappear from this Earth in just one hundred years. You have to learn how to accept that hard fact, without being overwhelmed by despair. That is why we have to learn to touch eternity in the present moment, with our in-breath and out-breath.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“The world has been through many crises over the millennia, but this is the first global crisis that has been created by humanity. Whether we take responsibility for our predicament will determine our future and the future of the world. There is an ancient teaching that in times of imminent catastrophe we are given the opportunity of divine intercession; we can look towards God and pray for divine help. We are at such a moment and the soul of the world is crying out. Are we prepared to welcome back the divine and work together with the forces of creation?”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“How can we heal and transform the world without the living presence of its Creator? Monotheism pointed us away from the many gods and goddesses of the ancient world towards a single transcendent God. If the living presence of God is to return to our consciousness it will be not as a step back to the old ways, but as a divine Oneness that embraces all of creation. Mystics have always experienced the oneness of being, the many facets of creation reflecting the single Essence. We are beginning to be aware of the ecological unity of life and its interconnectedness; economically and technologically we are being drawn into an era of global oneness. We now need to understand divine oneness: how the different qualities of the divine form a living presence in the inner and outer worlds, and how these qualities work together as one.

On a very simple level we do not have the power or technology to “fix” our ecological crisis on our own. The problems we have created are too severe. And yet here is the very root of our misunderstanding. We cannot do this on our own. We need to embrace the divine not as some transcendent being, but as a living presence that contains the visible and invisible worlds, all of the spirit and angelic beings that our ancestors understood. The oneness of God includes many different levels of existence.

We know for our individual self that real healing only takes place when our inner and outer selves are aligned, when we are nourished by our own soul and the archetypal forces within us. What is true for the individual is true for the whole. It is from the energies within and behind creation that the healing of creation will take place, because these are the beings that support, nourish and help creation to develop and evolve. How can we heal creation without the help of the devas and other spiritual forces that are within creation? They are waiting to be asked to participate, for their wisdom and power to be used. We need to once again work together with the divine oneness that is within and around us.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth

“our forgetfulness of its sacred nature, which is also our own sacred nature.”
― Thích Nhất Hạnh, Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth