Seeing Nature as a Franciscan with Michele Dunne and Sister Joan Brown

 What might it look like to live out a Franciscan vision of kinship in your daily life?  

In this episode, we’re learning to see nature through the eyes of a Franciscan. For this conversation, Brian McLaren is joined by Sr. Joan Brown and Michelle Dunne to explore the essence of Franciscan values and their relevance in today's world. They discuss the importance of community and kinship, translating faith into action, and the role of education and rituals in fostering a deeper connection with creation. This conversation underscores the need for collective action in addressing environmental challenges, the transformative power of prayer and contemplation, as well as confronting historical injustices and the call to embrace love and kinship in all aspects of life. 

About the guests: 

Michele Dunne OFS is a professed Secular Franciscan. Before coming to FAN, her career focused on the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy. From 2006 until 2021, she headed programs focused on peace, human rights, and democracy in the Middle East at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Atlantic Council. Before that, she served for nearly 20 years in the U.S. Department of State, including assignments in Jerusalem and Cairo. She holds a Ph.D. from Georgetown University and lives in Washington DC with her husband. 

Joan Brown is a Franciscan Sister from the Rochester, MN community, living and working in Albuquerque, New Mexico where she serves as the Executive Director of New Mexico Interfaith Power and Light (NM IPL). NM IPL is part of a national faith-based organization working to address climate justice. Originally from a small family farm in Kansas that still operates, her life has always revolved around love of and care for creation and social justice. Her BA from St. Mary College, Leavenworth, KS was in literature and journalism and she holds a master’s degree in Religion Philosophy and Cosmology from the California Institute of Integral Studies. Climate justice work has been a focus for decades and led her to participate with Franciscans International at UN COP meetings including Paris in 2015. She was one of twelve recipients of the 2015 Whitehouse Champions of Change award for faith leaders working on climate change. She has published articles and essays in national and local publications. Gardening, writing, baking (and sharing food), camping, hiking, community life, and contemplating and being with diverse kin in the natural world bring her joy, grounding and beauty. 

Resources: 

• The transcript for this episode can be found here. 
• Brian referenced two of his books, Life After Doom and The Galapagos Islands. 
• Check out the Franciscan Justice Circles here. 
• Check out Sr. Joan’s work with New Mexico Interfaith Power and Light, here. 
• Check out the Franciscan Action Network (FAN) here. 
• Subscribe to the FAN Newsletter here. 
• Subscribe to the FAN Environmental Justice Newsletter here. 
• Find out more about the Doctrine of Discovery here
• Find out more about musician April Stace here.  

Connect with us: 

Have a response to Brian's call to action at the end of this episode, or a question in general? 

Email us: podcasts@cac.org 

Send us a voicemail: cac.org/voicemail 

We'll be accepting questions for our Listener Questions episode until November 20th, 2024.