 |
Author, spiritual retreat leader, and speaker Leah Rampy examines the interconnectedness of all life on Earth and the human spiritual connection to a planet besieged by climate chaos. Her insightful prose is lyrically rendered, often revealing her deep personal love of the natural world. Early in the volume, she reminisces about the landscapes of her childhood in Kansas and her lifelong love of cottonwood trees: “I never tired of watching the leaves shimmer and glisten in the light or digging my fingers into the deep, rope-like grooves of their trunks.”
Rampy often invokes the physical liminal space where two ecosystems meet—ecotone—a dynamic in-between world where the flora and fauna of two ecosystems flourish together. She reminds the reader that without human intervention, these edge spaces thrive but are delicate and must be treated with respect and contemplation, just as humans must develop a connection to the sacred. She writes, “Surely this example [ecotone] has much to teach us metaphorically and literally about mutual thriving in edge times.”
Rampy faces these seeming dualities and contradictions head-on, encouraging readers to contemplate outdoors and become fully absorbed in the many large and small wonders there. She reminds readers that no one and nothing exists without these myriad connections to the natural world and that our human ties to nature are like “kith and kinship” within a sacred “kindom.” She delivers sufficient data about the alarming rise of climate change to satisfy the scientifically minded but also artfully discusses the contributions of revered philosophers, spiritual leaders, and mystics of many cultures who also gently and non-judgmentally admonish readers to seek communion with the sacred nature of life. Thought-provoking and unique, Rampy's book is a fascinating read.
RECOMMENDED by the US Review