T. Wilson Dickinson’s The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life serves as a kind of handbook for the path into such an open and hopeful future. Dickinson refuses to cave to despair, asserting that the interconnected and complex set of problems facing us in the climate crisis has a beautiful and joyful set of responses. The book is part personal testimony, part biblical devotional, and part clarion call to live out the green good news.
Webinar - The Green Good News: Parables and Finding our Place in Social Change - Presbyterian Hunger Program
A webinar on the book the Green Good News with Presbyterian Hunger Program and Earth Care Ministries. It focuses on Jesus' parables and finding out places in social change.
Green Gospels: Christ’s Path to Environmental Justice - YouTube
Interpretation (Journal) Review of the Book: The Green Good News: Christ's Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life
Many thanks to Joseph D. Blosser for his review of my book, The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life in Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 75.2 (2021): 183-184.
He writes:
“This compelling and accessible book offers a fresh interpretation of Jesus’s life and ministry. The “Green Good News” is that only by losing our lives—our lives of empire, the Gospel of Work, neoliberalism, efficiency, cleanliness, and consumerism—can we save them. Dickinson builds an ambitious vision for how an understanding of the environment challenges the way we read and understand the entirety of the Christian life. His work builds on the good work that has been done by scholars like Norman Wirzba, Ellen Davis, Fred Bahnson, and Walter Brueggemann.
Dickinson’s book employs a braided essay format as he brings together interpretation and analysis of the Bible, contemporary theological resources, and his own experience as a teacher and community organizer. His personal experiences give the book a gritty texture, connecting the biblical interpretation and theological analysis to the hard work, the trial and error, and the relationships that form covenantal communities. This format makes the book a good fit for educated lay readers, seminary students, pastors, and scholars alike.
The book situates the historical Jesus in his poor, agrarian context over against the ruling powers of empire, and connects this to a critique of the contemporary environmental movement. For example, Dickinson shows how the slow rhythms of gardens challenge the efficiency of empire. To do this he connects his experiences building community gardens with the scriptural framing of the cross between the Garden of Gethsemane and Mary’s mistaking of the risen Jesus as a gardener on Easter morning. The book offers a hearty critique of the global food system, using the stories of Jesus’s calling of the disciples to be “fishers of men,” the feeding of the 5,000, the manna in the desert, and the practices of Sabbath, Jubilee, and village life. Dickinson uses each story to build the case that we will be fed, not by the structures of empire (like monoculture, food banks, and charity-models), but by covenantal relationships of interdependence. The highlights of the book are its counter readings of often-told biblical passages, especially Jesus’s parables. Through these fresh readings, and practices, like dinner churches, faith-based organizing, and more, Dickinson offers hope for how we can be church together amidst a growing environmental and spiritual crisis.
The fast pace of the book may leave some readers wanting more, or deeper, interpretations of particular stories, and Dickinson will not satisfy anyone’s itch for quick-fix solutions. But the guiding vision of the book is compelling, evocative, and will challenge middle-to-upper income Christians (the stated audience). The primary challenge Dickinson delivers his audience is that in order to live the Green Good News we must reduce our privileges, comforts, and ease of life. While pruning may yield a bigger harvest, it still hurts. Losing your life to save it still requires dying. And dying is not easy.”
Webinar - The Green Good News - Center for Religion and Ecology at the University of the South
This is a webinar I led with the Center for Religion and Ecology at the University of the South on the book The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life.
Review: The Green Good News - In Sojourners Magazine
Avery Davis Lamb reviews The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life in Sojourners. He writes, “In The Green Good News, T. Wilson Dickinson does not settle for platitudes of hope. He does not affirm, as is so tempting for Christians, that all will be fine because of faith in God. Instead, Dickinson finds good news in the possibility of a beautiful and joyful set of responses to ecological breakdown. With humble writing grounded in stories of his own life, Dickinson offers a reading of scripture that does not separate the liberation of creation from the liberation of the poor but follows the vision of Jesus, in whom all creation—human and more-than-human—holds together. In a refreshing move, The Green Good News sheds the romanticism of creation care in favor of a biblically based environmental justice from the margins.”
Advent Preaching and Creation Care 2020 - Event Webinar and Food and Faith Podcast
This was an event sponsored by the Creation Care Alliance in North Carolina and Green Chalice for Pastors in preparation for Advent 2020, held on October 29.
You can find a recording here. My Presentation on “Preaching Advent and Environmental Justice: Foregrounding the Revolutionary Mary” can be found at 48:30.
The four presenters reconvened to have a similar conversation on The Food and Faith Podcast, which you can find here.
The Lectionary presenters were:
Advent 1-Rev. Derrick Weston, HopeSprings and Food and Faith Podcast
Advent 2-Rev. Anna Woofenden, Protestant Chaplain at Amherst College Find Informational Slides Here. Advent 2 Creation Presentation
Advent 3- Rev. Dr. Leah Schade, Assistant Professor of Preaching and Worship Lexington Theological Seminary Find Informational Slides Here. Advent 3, Year B, preaching through a green lens
Advent 4– Rev. Dr. Wilson Dickinson, Director of D.Min Program at Lexington Theological Seminary, Find Informational Slides Here. Advent 4 and Environmental Justice (Starting around 48:30 in the link above).
Review of the book: The Green Good News: Christ's Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life
From Rev. Rebecca Barnes, Coordinator of the Presbyterian Hunger Program:
“T. Wilson Dickinson has published an excellent book that will be of great importance to the church at large and the ecumenical movement for economic and environmental justice. It will be invigorating to individuals and congregations. As a professor at Lexington Theological Seminary in Kentucky and as a writer, pastor, organizer, Dickinson has created a clear, thought-provoking and hopeful book that is indeed “good news.”
“The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life” (2019) explores how Jesus encouraged, challenged, and shared ways for us to create sustainable, holistic, and joyful communities where healing, nourishment, and justice are available for all.
This is the kind of theological and scriptural study we need in our time. While living in the midst of a global pandemic, rampant racism, famines in multiple countries, and many people feeling isolated or alienated, the hope and joy of this book paint a different way of being, a new way we need as much as Jesus’ first disciples did. Dickinson’s thoughtful explorations of Jesus’ words and parables invite us into working towards a healed and inclusive community that is radically just.”
https://www.presbyterianmission.org/eco-journey/2020/10/12/green-good-news/
Review of the book: The Green Good News: Christ's Path to Sustaianble and Joyful Life
“This is a truly powerful book. It is not for the light reader looking for inspiration. This is a tome of knowledge that can be read and reflected on over a very long time. The depth of study is worth our time to help understand better the Ecological Justice challenges facing us at this point in history and gives us a theological framework based in Jesus’ teachings that will forever adjust how we read Scripture and apply it to our lives.
It was so powerful that I have shared this book with several other people who are involved in our Province V Creation Care Network and we are reading it as we ponder how we might encourage the Episcopal Church to broaden and deepen our work in Ecological Justice”
https://ramblingisgoodforthesoul.wordpress.com/2020/08/08/the-green-good-news/
Review of the book: The Green Good News: Christ's Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life
A Review from Rev. Dr. Dwight Moody of The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life”
“From start to finish, this book challenged every angle of my understanding of the Gospel, the Bible, and the Kingdom of God. It is not a big book or long—less than 200 pages; but it is a dense book, with ideas and interpretations piled one upon another in ways that forced me to read slowly, carefully, patiently….Dickinson offers interpretations of texts, especially those related to the ministry of Jesus (parables, miracles, controversies, events) that consistently “flip the script” that has dominated my life as a teacher and preacher, albeit less now that earlier. It is this that made the book challenging. I had to keep taking that picture of Jesus off the wall and replacing, first, the mat, then the frame itself, so that the Jesus that now hangs in my house is very different than the Jesus I first came to know and love. It is the same Jesus, really, and this process of reframing has been going on for a long time, but so much of it came together in this wonderful and compelling book.”
http://www.themeetinghouse.net/the-green-good-news/
Review of the book: The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life
A book review from Rev. Dr. John Henson of The Green Good News: Christ’s Path to Sustainable and Joyful Life:
“I recommend the book for several reasons. First, it is well written. Dickinson has a gift with words, expressing his ideas with prose that invites the reader to consider and engage with his views. Second, this book is great for Christians who are wanting to consider being green in our world and to work from a biblical vision of peace and justice. Dickinson gives them plenty to think about when it comes to how faith and action must work together when it comes to stewardship of this planet. Third, this book is great for church book studies and small groups, as it approaches the issues presented throughout the book from biblical texts and has discussion questions for each chapter.
While constantly being confronted by the bad news during this COVID-19 pandemic, reading The Green Good News has been an exercise in hope and a call to action for the future of our fragile planet.”
https://johnhenson.net/2020/06/10/book-review-of-green-good-news/
Earth Day Webinar on Church, Creation, and Community
To commemorate the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day Lexington Theological Seminary hosted a webinar on Church, Creation, and Community. Dean Loida Martell opened us with prayer. Rev. Carol L. Devine set the stage on climate change and served as moderator, Dr Emily Askew provided theological reflections on despair and hope, I (Wilson Dickinson) gave a presentation on finding our parts in social change, and Rev. Dr. Leah Schade reflected on the lectionary texts of the Easters season for preaching with a green lens.
Scholars Roundtable: For Such a Time as This: Ecotheology, Spirits Afoot, and the Bible Today - The Westar Institute
Here is a recording of a roundtable webinar I did early in the COVID pandemic with Dr. Mary Keller on “For Such a Time as This: Ecotheology, Spirits Afoot, and the Bible Today” hosted by the Westar Institute.
Giving up Captialism for Lent Series - The Bias
This Lent I helped edit and curate a series for The Bias on Giving up Capitalism for Lent (while it was disrupted by the COVID pandemic I am hoping to expand and deepen it in future years).
Here is my first Introduction to the series, “Following Christ into the Wilderness”
For the second installment, David Dault’s “Devliver Us from Our Comforts: Lent Beyond Bourgoies Discipliens.”
For the third instalment, Klem-Marí Cajigas’ “Lent, Coffee, and Covid.”
For the fourth installment, Kira Dault's “Knowledge and Power in Holy Week.”
Interview on Homebrewed Christianity - Life after a Neoliberal Compliant Church
My conversation with Tripp Fuller on Homebrewed Christianity. This podcast touches on the new book, The Green Good News, my first book, Exercises in New Creation, and much more.
https://trippfuller.com/2020/02/20/wilson-dickinson-faith-after-a-neo-liberal-compliant-church/?fbclid=IwAR3WjTPzBjZX9rOg5COgGIEyRsA6_VOa_rhaxvZ-hsKK3pjwlnwJSoOpMPU
Australia’s Fires are Apocalyptic. They Also Reveal the Good News. - Article - The Bias
The apocalyptic fires in Australia reveal that our world is on fire and any response short of systemic change is fraught with callousness and complacency. The apocalyptic visions of Jesus show us how we might start the joyful and revolutionary work of building collective power and loving community.
Read more here:
https://christiansocialism.com/australia-fires-apocalyptic-climate-change-anti-capitalism/?fbclid=IwAR2ifRnH1kzUcvLGBbnUyNi1lACMzcTnsW6VZ1Qu4FX7F-nhWOPqNib4OMU
Food and Faith Podcast interview on the book, The Green Good News
Check out this interview on the Food and Faith Podcast, hosted by leaders of the Christian Food Movement Anna Woofenden and Sam Chamelin. We talk about my book The Green Good News, the possibility of a cosmology of blessing, the deeper lessons of being rooted in place, and the way the gospel speaks to the current climate crisis.
https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-v9gvk-cfccd6?fbclid=IwAR1lf8vWbePC8c6cmuuLUwRLZhC5H19PKTJI-hwKrT6r2r2mQq5-G4OD8Qw#.XiB4dMysN-I.facebook
Things Not Seen Podcast on the book: The Green Good News: Christ's Path to Sustainable Life
Check out this interview on Things Not Seen, a radio show and podcast out of Chicago hosted by the always brilliant and insightful David Dault. In this podcast we talk about my book The Green Good News, the pervasive anxiety of our times, the root of this pain in structures of empire, and the way that the Gospels provide a vision and practices for us to transform our lives and communities.
https://www.thingsnotseenradio.com/shows/2002-dickinson?fbclid=IwAR0mLwYMs3JjET1Yg0kD_CeOdDtLI-RCuY1QGa41BvJbvE_EkKToF_K1PZ0
Taking a Left Turn at Christmas: Consumption or Social Reproduction?
Here is a post I wrote for The Bias on re-thinking our approach to Christmas. I am proposing that we not just draw a critical eye to issues of consumerism, but that we struggle with the ways that many forms of celebrating Christmas deform our hearts and relationships, and that we begin to pursue alternatives that will cultivate justice and joy.
https://christiansocialism.com/2019/12/23/taking-a-left-turn-on-christmas-consumption-capitalism-social-reproduction/
Climate Change and Social Change - Presentations
These four presentations on Climate Change and Social Change sketch a vision for how different efforts and roles in local and broader movements for food, climate, and social justice can fit together and the role Christian communities can play.
This presentation gives an overview of the four presentations.
1 - Rethinking the Sources, or the What - This first presentation deepens our understanding of the sources of the ecological crisis so as to broaden the avenues for change we perceive and that we can pursue.
2 - Timelines and Timescales, or the When - This presentation articulates the need to live and act with a sense of urgency and an abiding prophetic patience and courage. It outlines how our efforts can operate on multiple timelines to work for short-term mitigation and long-term system change.
3 - Roles and Relationships, or the Who - This third installment is on relationships and roles, and is focused on the dynamic work of coalition building and cultivating community.
4 - Practices, Places, and Power, or the How - This fourth presentation considers how we can bring about change through transforming our ways of life.
Food and Faith Podcast - Rewritten Theology
I loved being a part of this conversation with Same Chamelin and Anna Woofenden, on the always great Food and Faith Podcast. It’s a conversation about the Ecotones of the Spirit conference from this past summer, but its really about how food and faith renew theology. the spiritual practices that can change our communities, and the ecological practices that can transform the church.
