“Where Have We Come From; Where Are We Going?” Recent Environmentalists Mini-Series #3
John A. Grim and Mary Evelyn Tucker
What can we do about the Earth crisis we are in?
Would it help us if we could recognize the place of our Earth in the vastness of the universe?
These questions can lead us to a call to action!
Mary Evelyn Tucker and her husband John Grim answered that call years ago.
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Mary Evelyn's concern for the growing environmental crisis, especially in Asia, led her to organize with John a series of ten conferences on World Religions and Ecology at Harvard (1995-1998), which explored the ecological and justice dimensions of the world’s religions.
They then were series editors of the 10 Harvard volumes resulting from those conferences on Religion and Ecology.
After those conferences Mary Evelyn and John founded the Forum on Religion and Ecology, which they presently oversee at Yale University.
Mary Evelyn specializes in East Asian religions, especially Confucianism. She has published five volumes on Confucianism, including Confucian Spirituality with Tu Weiming.
John’s area of scholarly work focuses on Indigenous traditions. He taught courses in Native American and Indigenous religions and with Mary Evelyn world religions and ecology.
John’s published works include: The Shaman: Patterns of Religious Healing Among the Ojibway Indians, 1983.
John and Mary Evelyn co-edited a volume entitled Worldviews and Ecology and also the Routledge Handbook on Religion and Ecology.
They have published a volume on Ecology and Religion which they use in their online courses. Together they have created six online Yale/Coursera classes in Religions and Ecology: Restoring the Earth Community, which include Indigenous religions, Western religions, and Asian religions.
They have also created three additional online Yale/Coursera courses for their multi-media project Journey of the Universe.
Mary Evelyn and John are affiliated faculty with the Yale Center for Environmental Justice at the Yale School of the Environment.
Mary Evelyn and John
—Above from Yale/Coursera and Yale Forum on Relgion and Ecology
Mary Evelyn and John met in 1975 when they were both students in the history of religion program at Fordham University founded by cultural historian, Thomas Berry. He married them in 1978 and they worked closely with him for 40 years.
Thomas Berry
They edited Thomas’ books, including The Sacred Universe (Columbia University Press, 2009) and Selected Writings (Orbis, 2014).
They published Thomas Berry: A Biography (Columbia University Press, 2019) with Andrew Angyal.
And until 2020, following in Berry’s footsteps, John served as president of the American Teilhard Association and Mary Evelyn as Vice President for over three decades.
To extend Berry’s work, Mary Evelyn created a multi-media project with John Grim and with Brian Thomas Swimme entitled Journey of the Universe, which includes an Emmy award winning film, a book from Yale (2011), Journey Conversations, and three online classes, including one on the Worldview of Thomas Berry.
THE ORIGIN
The Journey of the Universe was birthed at the Riverdale Center for Religious Research in New York, which Thomas Berry directed. It began with his call for a "New Story" in 1978. —Journey of the Universe website:
www.journeyoftheuniverse.org
I (Anne) have cherished memories in connection with Thomas Berry and The Riverdale Center, as well as with John Grim and Mary Evelyn Tucker.
I have long admired the work of John and Mary Evelyn, especially enjoying their enriching talks at the American Teilhard Association annual meetings in Manhattan.
The Riverdale Center for Religious Research:
When I was preparing for my Master’s degree in systematic theology at Fordham University in the 1990’s, I studied under Ewert Cousins who would sometimes meet with us at the Riverdale Center. There we would be enriched by theological talks given by Thomas Berry (who was the Center’s director from 1970-1995).
In the years following my graduation from Fordham, my husband Bruno and I continued attending Thomas’ monthly roundtable talks, travelling from our home in Connecticut.
When we moved to Riverdale ourselves in 1995, we were thrilled to be so near to the Center and to Thomas and his wisdom, only to learn that he was soon retiring to the South Carolina hills of his youth and the Riverdale Center was set to be closed.
Photo by Gretchen McHugh
Thomas Berry at Riverdale, with the 400-year old Great Red Oak in the background.
Sadly, the tree was felled after the property was sold.
I think the oddest coincidence was my meeting John Grim on an evening sometime around 1983 in Georgetown, CT, which is an historic village comprised of sections of its four neighboring towns of Weston, Wilton, Redding, and Ridgefield in Fairfield County.
This meeting occurred not long after Bruno and I had moved to Weston and I was still feeling like a displaced New Yorker.
John was speaking in the initial office of the St. Benedict Guild in a building that was adjacent to the Georgetown Post Office, which was just a quarter mile up the road from our home in Weston (shortly thereafter, the Guild relocated to the nearby town of Wilton).
The Guild was an outreach of the Benedictine Grange in West Redding, a ministry begun by Father John Giuliani, a priest of the Diocese of Bridgeport, CT.
If I am remembering correctly, John Grim’s talk centered on his newly published book The Shaman (which has since been republished).
The gathering was small and John shared some lecture time with Sr. Kathleen Deignan, CND who had just been awarded her PhD from Fordham University.
I do not recall how I randomly learned of this talk that was so close to home, but it certainly was a welcome and very enjoyable evening for me.
John Grim, rear jacket flyleaf of The Shaman, 1983
Here is an easy (for anyone) Call to Action:
The words in the title of this post —“Where Have We Come From; Where Are We Going?”—are from the website for Journey of the Universe at www.journeyoftheuniverse.org
They continue with an invitation:
To ponder these questions, we invite you to:
watch the film, read the book, listen to podcast conversations, and participate in online classes.
Discover
How this dynamic universe has evolved over billions of years and how the Earth arose with myriad life forms, including humans.
Remember
How we belong to the larger Earth community with a
profound sense of interdependence and responsibility for the continuity of life.
Hear
A New Story grounded in science, woven with poetic
images and philosophical insights, which offers a way
forward [through the vision of Thomas Berry].
An Integrated Cosmology
From decades of studying the world’s religions and cultures, Thomas Berry understood that a cosmological story was what inspired people to live with a sense of larger meaning and purpose.
But he also realized that science was giving us a vast evolutionary perspective that needed to be integrated with religious narratives.
The documentary film Journey of the Universe is excellent—it is beautiful and inspiring! I have seen it twice, once when it was shown at the United Nations.
View the Trailer of Journey of the Universe!
Following are two flyers from Mary Evelyn that might serve to assist us in our own Call To Action.
ALERT:
Full images of the flyers are non-interactive. Currently, the website application C:WED uses does not support the pasting of an interactive flyer directly into the post.
SOLUTION:
To take advantage of all that the flyers offer, fully interactive versions follow the non-interactive images.
The interactive versions do require clicking a link to open them.
Note: If the non-interactive flyer information is too small, pinch the screen with two fingers and move them outward (on a touch screen or trackpad) in order to ENLARGE THE TEXT.
Image of the Yale Forum Flyer (non-interactive)
Here is the fully interactive Forum flyer. Click the title to open:
YALE FORUM ON RELIGION AND ECOLOGY
You can also sign up here for their monthly Forum newsletter
Your CALL TO ACTION could be as simple as becoming more informed about our universe. Viewing the film is an easy way to do just that.
Image of Journey of the Universe Flyer (non-interactive)
Here is the fully interactive Journey of the Universe flyer. Click the title to open:
You can also sign up here for the monthly Journey of the Universe newsletter.
You can also gain free access to the Journey of the Universe film by clicking on the URL below and then adding the password.
Or by pasting the URL into a browser, such as Google Chrome or Safari, then adding the password:
https://vimeo.com/36950412
Password: whowouldyoube619
We are truly part of something bigger. When we realize this, it changes our perspective. We sense how vast and wonderful—awesome—is our existence. We cherish our planet and its own place in the vastness, the order, and the beauty of the universe.
ADDENDUM:
Mary Evelyn has shared some resources on climate justice:
—MRS ROBINSON https://kinema.com/films/mrs-robinson-ue3sv9
About the film: MRS ROBINSON tells the inspirational life story of change-maker Mary Robinson: Ireland’s first female President, a pioneering UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Co-Founder of Project Dandelion. MRS ROBINSON is more than a documentary, it’s a blueprint for modern leadership. The film empowers us all to join Mary Robinson in taking a stand in the fight for climate justice.
—Learn - Project Dandelion https://www.projectdandelion.com/learn#welcome-letter
…to be continued
with one more post at this time in our mini-series on relatively recent individual environmental activists.
(One additional person who will be featured—in early 2026—is Sr. Kathleen Deignan, CND, PhD for her environmental work. )
Our overall two-arm series will culminate with an examination of images of the Divine and the effect these images have on the treatment of Women and the Earth!
NOTE: The topics we have been covering on Women and the Earth will always be open for further discussion—as well as open to receive your submissions of stories.
In Your Own Words:
Previous Post: “Youth Are For Nature,” by Anne Andersson July 24, 2025
—Thank you. Hope you are both well. —PH
Previous Post: “Believe the Women,” by Anne Andersson July 31, 2025
—Great post, Anne. Haven’t seen the interview yet but I will. —NM
—Thanks and good for you for running the interview!
—MET
Preview of current post: “Where Have We Come From; Where Are We Going?” by Anne Andersson, July 30, 2025
—As always, good work, Anne. —E
—Looks great! —MET
C:WED Wish List:
—If you have any environmentalists whom you would like to highlight, please send their stories to us (with their permission, of course) at:
info@cwed.org
