Season 3, Ep. 2: Creating Sustainable Futures with Sr. Claire McGowan, OP

Our March episode will feature Sr. Claire McGowan, OP, a Dominican Sister of Peace and former Executive Director of New Pioneers, a community non-profit organization founded in Washington County, Kentucky to promote sustainable thinking and sustainable development in this rural community of 12,000.

Living in Bardstown, Kentucky, Sr. Claire talks about her work in ministry with New Pioneers for a Sustainable Future and how clarifying our relationship with the Natural World is necessary as we inch closer and closer to irreversible damage to our home and ourselves. We discuss Laudato Si, Pope Francis’ encyclical on the environment published in 2014, and a section of a book by Thick Nhat Hanh, titled Love Letter to Earth published in 2013 - both companion pieces in this continued thinking.

In future episodes of Generative Spirits, we will continue to highlight the work of sisters by giving particular focus to their ministries, including the Sisters of Charity Foundation of Cleveland. We look forward to incorporating other essential voices to this conversation in the months to come.

Links:
1. To learn more about New Pioneers for a Sustainable Future and to support their work, please visit https://newpioneersfsf.org/

2. Read about Sr. Claire’s work with New Pioneers in an article titled Sister Claire’s Green Habit, written for Kentucky Living in 2011: https://www.kentuckyliving.com/archives/no-title-2712

3. Read Ten Love Letters to Earth by Thich Nhat Hanh here: https://emergencemagazine.org/essay/ten-love-letters-to-the-earth/

4. To read Laudato Si: On Care for our Common Home written by Pope Francis, the first encyclical to focus on the environment, visit https://www.usccb.org/offices/general-secretariat/laudato-si-care-our-common-home

5. “We will not save what we do not love” - Adrienne Rich