The Holy Wild with Victoria Loorz

In this conversation, Victoria Loorz is joined by Rachel Fleming, climate scientist, former Environment Agency policy advisor, writer, educator, and part of the Animate Earth founding circle. Together they explore modern animism, the remembering of the “common wild tongue,” and what it means to rebuild intimacy with a living, intelligent world. Rachel shares her journey bridging climate science, holistic ecology, and spiritual practice, reflecting on the limits of purely technical or policy-based responses to ecological collapse. Through stories of place, trees, and faithful return, the conversation traces the long human exile from belonging and the quiet emergence of a different way of being human rooted in listening, love, and relationship. Weaving themes of grief, beauty, ancestral memory, and hope, this episode invites listeners to remember that transformation rarely begins with grand solutions, but with simple, devoted acts of attention that restore our capacity to speak with and listen to the living world.Connect with Rachel:Website: animate-earth.orgSubstack: The Common Wild TongueMentioned in the episode:Stephan Harding pioneering Holistic ScienceColin Campbell: colincampbell.co.zaMonica Gagliano: monicagagliano.comAnna Breytenbach: animalspirit.orgOxford Real Farming Conference: orfc.org.ukNathanial Hughs & The School of Intuitive Herbalism: schoolofintuitiveherbalism.weedsintheheart.org.ukPatrick MacManaway-The Land Whisperer: patrickmacmanaway.comDr. Lyla June Johnson: lylajune.comConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:07:26 – Interview begins with invocation10:18 – The mountain that raised Rachel14:37 – How Rachel comes to this work through science19:57 – Holistic science21:33 – Animate Earth25:59 – The common wild tongue31:10 – Bridging “woo”35:09 – It is actually simple38:20 – Evolution is a spiral42:49 – The importance of subtle work44:48 – Needed medicine47:19 – Interconnection goes so deep48:42 – The heart field51:55 – Neighbor ash tree55:38 – Rachel’s work57:54 – Invitation to advocacy59:53 – Credits

In this conversation, Debra Rienstra, PhD, author of Refugia Faith and professor of English at Calvin University, joins Victoria Loorz to explore refugia, a biological term for small pockets of life that survive widespread environmental stress and become sources of regeneration after collapse. Debra invites us to imagine these protected pockets are also in our communities as forms of sanctuary amid increasingly uninhabitable social, spiritual, and ecological conditions. Together, they reflect on how small gatherings rooted in love for the land can counter paralysis in the face of global crisis and rewild our sense of vocation and voice. They explore the spiritual risk of loving places we may not own or keep, while naming how restoration begins through intimate, connected acts of care that allow life to persist and return.Connect with Debra:Website: debrarienstra.comBook: Refugia Faith: Seeking Hidden Shelters, Ordinary Wonders, and the Healing of the EarthNewsletter: refugianewsletter.substack.comUpcoming Book: Refugia Church (January 2027)Mentioned in the episode:Book: Great Tide Rising: Towards Clarity and Moral Courage in a time of Planetary Change by Kathleen Dean MooreOrganization: blackchurchfoodsecurity.netBook: Here Comes the Sun: A Last Chance for the Climate and a Fresh Chance for Civilization by Bill McKibbenEncyclical Letter Laudato Si' of the Holy Father Francis on Care For Our Common HomeEncyclical Letter Fratelli Tutti of the Holy Father Francis on Fraternity and Social FriendshipConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 — Introduction03:48 — Refugia08:58 — Finding My Small Work11:44 — Deciding the Work Based on Context14:33 — Examples of Human Refugia20:21 — From Passivity to Citizenship24:21 — Loving Places That Are Only Yours for a Time29:36 — Choosing to Belong31:59 — Grieving Reality Together34:18 — Mitigation and Adaptation40:02 — A Kalo Farmer in Relationship With the Land43:04 — The Book of Nature & Pantheism Paranoia46:30 — The Wild Edge50:03 — Wild Invitation53:24 — Credits

Leah Rampy, an author and spiritual formation leader focused on ecological belonging, shares her transformative journey from corporate life to eco-spirituality. She emphasizes the kinship we share with trees, breaking down the armor we build for survival. The duo discusses how storytelling conveys deep spiritual truths, how to practice reciprocity with nature, and the grieving process for our environmental losses. Leah also introduces her Wild Church, fostering community and communion through silence and shared gifts, inviting listeners to embrace our interdependence with the Earth.

In this conversation, Certified Soul Level Animal Communicators and grief-intuitive coaches from The Animal Communication Collective (ACC)—Julie Hirt, Karen Dendy Smith, and Meredith Tollison—offer a vivid picture of animal communication as a soul-to-soul exchange that restores trust, deepens wholeness, and opens doorways to healing and transformation. They demystify why losing an animal often breaks us open more than losing a human, explore how animals help surface grief we have long buried, and share stories from clients who continue receiving guidance through images, humor, sensations, and inner knowing even after their animals have crossed the veil. The trio also reflect on how each of them slowly found their way back to the sacred after religious trauma, supported by magnolia trees, ocean wind, and the quiet companionship of the animals who stayed close to them. You can hear more from Julie, Karen, and Meredith on their own podcast, The Animal Communication podcast. Connect with The Animal Communicators:Website: animalcommunicationcollective.comPodcast: theanimalcommunicationpodcast.comJulie: juliehirt-intuitive.comKaren: karendendysmith.comMeredith: meredithtollison.comMentioned in the episode:Book: All Creatures Great and Small by James HerriotBook: Opal- The Journal of an Understanding Heart by Opal WhiteleyFigure: Anna Breytenbach @ animalspirit.orgConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 — Introduction05:32 — Interview begins06:23 — Introducing Julie06:51 — Introducing Karen07:45 — Introducing Meredith08:28 — Unconditional love & authenticity13:33 — Julie’s grief origins16:02 — Karen’s grief origins17:41 — Meredith’s grief origins19:21 — Grief unlocked by companion animals22:34 — The felt sense of animals in spirit26:27 — The claires / intuitive senses30:48 — Accessing the sacred31:38 — Julie’s spiritual upbringing34:29 — Karen’s spiritual upbringing36:13 — Meredith’s spiritual upbringing38:21 — Reconnecting words41:34 — Why grief feels different with animals43:37 — Loss rituals44:44 — The “placeness” of animals54:38 — The animal communication collective56:43 — Wild invitation58:09 — Credits

In this conversation with Victoria Loorz, Randy Woodley shares stories from his Cherokee lineage, his mother’s deep communion with plants and animals, and his decades of land based ministry at Eloheh Farm. Together they explore why many today stand on the "inside and outside edges" of the Christian story, the collapse of institutional religion, and how Creator often works through seasons of chaos. Woodley describes this era as a time of composting, where old systems break down so more relational and grounded ways of being can emerge. He invites listeners to let go of rigid categories and doctrines and return to what he calls our original human vocation: co-sustaining the community of creation through simple acts of love, reciprocity, and right relationship, where meals become communion, tending becomes prayer, and all beings are kin.Rev. Dr. Randy Woodley, Ph.D., is a farmer, activist scholar, speaker, teacher, and Indigenous wisdom keeper whose work spans spirituality, justice, culture, racial diversity, regenerative farming, and our relationship with the Earth. Connect with Randy: Book: Becoming Rooted: One Hundred Days of Reconnecting with Sacred EarthBook: How Western Christian Got It Wrong (Forthcoming)Substack: @rwoodley7Personal Website: randywoodley.comEloheh Website: eloheh.orgMentioned in the episode:Documentary: The Year The Earth ChangedConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 – Introduction06:35 – Interview Starts08:14 – The Land Who Raised Randy10:08 – Academy Experience11:53 – Eloheh12:50 – Bridging Across the Edges15:09 – Widespread Abandonment of Institutionalized Western Religion19:05 – Replacing the Programs with Relationship23:56 – Co-Sustainers27:06 – Finding New Language31:15 – Becoming Rooted35:33 – Repairing the Separations37:57 – Seeds Are Our Treasure39:29 – The War on Indigenous Lands41:58 – Create Human Rights for the Earth43:40 – Sacred Clowns46:14 – Sacred Invitation

Biologist, biosemiotician, philosopher, and author of Matter and Desire: An Erotic Ecology, Andreas Weber, PhD, joins Victoria Loorz for a heartfelt conversation about reality as a sacred, living process of relationship - the continual desire to give life and what the heart knows as love. Together they explore how trauma causes us to forget our wholeness and how true healing is an act of remembering. Drawing on Sufi mysticism and the writings of Erich Fromm, Weber describes love as “the interest in the aliveness of the other” and names this time of global unraveling as a painful yet essential gift calling us to live in truth. Through stories of rivers, trees, & animals, he reveals how the more-than-human world restores trust, belonging, and courage. Blending science, mysticism, and deep ecology, you're invited you to sit with the living world, listen with an open heart, and remember that you are love, embodied and alive.Dr Andreas Weber is a biologist, philosopher, and poet and teaches ecophilosophy and ecological aesthetics at the Berlin University of the Arts. He holds degrees in marine biology and cultural studies, earned his PhD in philosophy in with a dissertation titled in English “Nature as Meaning: An Attempt at a Semiotic Theory of the Living” .Connect with Andreas: Book: Matter and Desire: An Erotic Ecology by Andreas WeberConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:0:00 — Introduction5:54 — Interview7:03 — Living Through Trauma and Pain10:38 — We Exist Only as Love13:32 — Dissolving at the Shore18:20 — Meeting Victoria’s More-Than-Human Neighbors19:58 — Defining the Sacred22:39 — Love Is the Interest in the Aliveness of the Other24:10 — Two Sides of Gifts27:37 — Our Era of Dying May Be a Gift31:37 — Religios Is Remembering It Has Always Been One35:43 — Resistance as Simply Truth39:27 — Truths About You and Your Heart47:56 — Wandering Invitation

In this episode of The Holy Wild, Scottish author and activist Alastair McIntosh explores the spiritual, historical, and ecological roots of our collective crisis of belonging. Grounded in the history of the Highland Clearances, he offers this chapter of Scotland’s past as a lens for understanding global patterns of displacement, from the enslavement of African peoples to the colonization of Indigenous lands and the refugees of our own time. He reveals how being unsettled from land fractures psyche and soul. Mcintosh invites a path toward compassion through the Scottish wisdom of Caledonian antisyzygy, the capacity to hold opposites. He weaves insights on complicity in capitalism, the moral paradoxes of renewable energy and wild land, and the call to reconcile inner and outer divisions. McIntosh calls for a re-membering of what has been dismembered- to rekindle community, restore reverence for the Earth, and awaken the soul of belonging in our time.Alastair McIntosh is a Scottish writer, academic, and activist raised on the Isle of Lewis whose work spans spirituality, community, land reform, and ecology. An honorary professor at the University of Glasgow and currently serving as director of the GalGael Trust, he has been instrumental in Scottish campaigns such as the Isle of Eigg community buy-out and the defense of the Isle of Harris against a proposed mega-quarry. His most recognized book, Soil and Soul: People versus Corporate Power, stands alongside his most beautiful work, Poacher’s Pilgrimage, a twelve-day walk through the wilds and villages of his home islands of Lewis and Harris.Connect with Alastair: Website: alastairmcintosh.comBook: Soil and SoulBook: Riders On The StormBook: Poacher's PilgrimageBook: Rekindling CommunityMentioned in the episode:Book: The Unsettling of America by Wendell BerryScripture: Numbers 21:4-9Academic Journal: Theology In ScotlandConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 Introduction07:59 Interview09:47 The Spirituality of Place10:26 The Land Who Raised Alastair12:59 Community Sense for Sharing14:31 Communitarian Identity17:38 The Unsettling22:27 Mary Anne MacLeod24:44 Antisyzygy29:15 Dissecting the Scottish Wind Farm Conversation33:52 Returning to Local Thinking35:20 The Promise of Being Placed37:47 Connection with Soul39:04 Practical Expression42:58 The Darkest Times Is When the Human Spirit Comes Alive44:59 A Privilege to Live in Difficult Times45:52 The Rubric of Regeneration47:25 Alastair’s Current Work50:35 The Bronze Snake53:02 Palestine and Scotland58:31 Wild Invitation60:42 Credits

In this conversation, Victoria Loorz and pastor-activist Michael Ellick explore the lifelong dance between wilderness, spirit, and faith. Michael shares stories of his mystical childhood in the forests of Washington—his first teacher in wonder and interconnection—and how that early “forest sense” eventually brought him through disillusionment with the church into a deeper, embodied Christianity. Together they reflect on grief, reciprocity, and the call to live as part of creation rather than separate from it. From the undulating forest floor to Holy Saturday’s sacred grief, from ancient language to feminine images of the divine, this dialogue traces a hopeful reformation of faith rooted in relationship, wildness, and love.Michael Ellick is the Lead Minister at University Congregational United Church of Christ in Seattle. A former community organizer and early leader in the Occupy movement, he works to help faith communities confront racism, colonialism, and disconnection from the natural world. Trained in comparative religion, philosophy, and depth psychology, he integrates insights from Christian, Buddhist, and Indigenous traditions in his ministry and teaching.Connect with Michael: Website: universityucc.orgPodcast: Gospel of Direct ExperienceMentioned in the episode:Gary Snyder essay on reinhabitationRomans 8Gospel of ThomasConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:0:00 Introduction7:28 The Land Who Raised Michael9:20 Big Rock10:56 Forest Sense14:25 Coming Out Into the Wild15:50 Language to Speak Of18:24 What It Means to Be of a Place20:25 Swapping Image for the Real Thing22:56 Trained in Reciprocity26:10 There Is an If in Romans 830:50 Separation Is Part of It34:17 Open to Grief40:19 Trickster Coyote44:45 Shifts from the Inside Edges50:08 The New Story55:53 Wild Invitation59:34 Credits

In this conversation, Victoria Loorz and Dr. Forrest Inslee explore how Christian faith is expanding beyond human-centered concerns into a vision of beloved community that embraces all of creation. Drawing from his work with Circlewood and the Earthkeepers podcast, Forrest shares stories of churches learning to “listen to the land,” embrace ecological discipleship, and practice what he calls co-powerment—partnership rooted in humility and reciprocity. Together, they reflect on how theology, community development, and lived experience can guide us toward a new story: one where spirituality is woven through relationship with soil, water, creatures, and the wider web of life.Dr. Forrest Inslee is a teacher, ethnographer, and spiritual guide whose work bridges culture, ecology, and faith. He is Associate Director of Circlewood, where he helps cultivate communities of ecological consciousness, and also serves as a Guide with Seminary of the Wild Earth. Forrest hosts the Earthkeepers podcast, drawing on decades of experience as a professor, social entrepreneur, and cross-cultural practitioner. His life and work reflect a deep commitment to reimagining Christian faith as a practice of belonging within the whole community of creation.Connect with Forrest:Circlewood Website: circlewood.onlineEarth Keepers Podcast: earthkeepers.onlineEcological Disciple Program: ecodisciple.comMentioned in the episode:A Rocha USA Website: arocha.usBook: Plundered: The Tangled Roots of Racial and Environmental Injustice by David W SwansonBook: Engaging the Powers by Walter WinkBook: The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why by Phyllis TickleBook: Belonging Without Othering: How We Save Ourselves and the World by John A PowellConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 – Introduction06:06 – Community Development Beyond Human-only Needs12:35 – Stories From The Inside Edges17:24 – Creation Care Is Part of Our Heritage19:28 – Redefining Cosmos22:48 – Listening To A Triangle of Land30:03 – Co-Powerment32:12 – The Transition is Holy and Messy36:26 – The Circlewood Vision42:04 – Collaborating Without Othering43:46 – Broadening The Vision45:10 – Integrating Vocation47:56 – Forrest’s “Landscaping” Experience51:43 – Coyote59:44 – Sacred Invitation61:34 – Harold and Honeybees64:29 – Credits

In this episode of The Holy Wild, Victoria Loorz and Dr. Sheri Kling explore how personal trauma, dreamwork, and encounters with the natural world can become gateways into deeper wholeness and divine relationship. Sheri weaves process theology and Jungian psychology into lived stories of synchronicity, butterflies, and sacred encounters that remind us we are co-creators in an unfolding cosmos of meaning. What emerges is an invitation to trust the flow of becoming, where even separation is part of the holy dance that leads us back into connection with Earth, Spirit, and one another.Dr. Sheri D. Kling, Ph.D., serves as the Director of Process & Faith (a multifaith network for relational spirituality under the Center for Process Studies) and is also the interim minister of Redeemer Lutheran Church in Bradenton, Florida. She earned her doctorate in Religion: Process Studies from Claremont School of Theology and brings together theology, depth psychology, mystical wisdom traditions, relational worldviews, and the intersections of spirituality and science to help individuals find meaning, belonging, and transformation. A theologian, teacher, songwriter, and spiritual mentor, Kling is a faculty member at the Haden Institute and Claremont School of Theology (adjunct), and authored A Process Spirituality: Christian and Transreligious Resources for Transformation; she also offers courses, concerts, retreats, and dynamic “Music & Message” presentations.Connect with Sheri:Organization Website: Process and FaithBook: A Process Spirituality: A Christian and Transreligious Resources for TransformationBook: Finding Home: Rural Reflections on the Journey to WholenessProcess Pop-Up Video with Victoria LoorzMentioned in the episode:Wiki: Alfred North WhiteheadBook: Black Beauty by Anna SewellBook: Women Who Run With The Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype by Clarissa Pinkola EstésBook: Natural Spirituality: A Handbook for Jungian Inner Work in Spiritual Community by Joyce Rockwood HudsonBook: Radical Nature: The Soul of Matter by Christian de QuinceyBook: The Archetypal Process: Self and Divine and Whitehead, Jung, and HillmanDavid GriffinBook: Memories, Dreams, Reflections by Carl JungBook: Possessing The Secret Of Joy by Alice WalkerConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: hello@wildspirituality.earthLinktree: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 Introduction07:04 Sheri's Background, Looking For Belonging09:11 A Love Of Horses09:53 Suburban Nature And The Golf Course11:41 The North Georgia Mountains12:55 Finding Comfort In Nature From Trauma13:55 Finding The Divine Feminine14:31 Finding Home15:46 Emerging From Emotional Numbness17:46 Connecting With Jungian Work18:53 Deep Relationship With Place21:27 Introduction To Process Theology28:13 Connecting Inner Wholeness With Universal Wholeness31:44 Whitehead + Jung33:55 Dream Work And Syncronicity42:12 Transformational Practices Of Wholeness47:00 Sin And Separation As Necessary51:49 The Butterfly Pushing Out55:47 Invitation And A Story With A Chimpanzee