The Well: Church of the Wild Retreat

The reality of ecological and collective cultural grief felt by nearly everyone (whether they can identify it or not) is a call for help, not only for the planet but for our own souls. Wild spirituality is a remembering our place in the whole alive Earth system, which is a place of intimacy with our Place. It is a restoration of kindred relationality, the sacred conversation with the whole beloved community beyond even our species.

This daylong retreat explores the practice of wild spirituality and the ways our religious tradition has always been deeply integrated with the land herself….even if we in our culture and religious traditions have forgotten. Our bodies still remember. Through new and ancient practices, we can re-integrate our spirituality with a deepening, restored relationship with Earth and experience once again the sacred presence in all things.

Like many who feel unfulfilled by traditional faith expressions, Victoria Loorz went in search of a spirituality strong enough to reckon with the unraveling of her vocation, identity, and planet, and found herself in the wilderness. With an ecospiritual lens on biblical narratives and a fresh look at a community larger than our own species, her book, Church of the Wild: How Nature Invites Us into the Sacred, uncovers the wild roots of faith and helps us deepen our commitment to a suffering earth by falling in love with it — and calling it church. Through mystical encounters with wild deer, whispers from a scrubby oak tree, wordless conversation with a cougar, and more, Loorz helps us connect to a love that literally holds the world together — a love that calls us into communion with all creatures.

This program is in person.