Beyond the Pandemic: Spiritual and Ecological Challenges

Overview

"In Beyond the Pandemic,  Diarmuid O'Murchu calls us to know life in a larger way, aware of the need for a new mind-set and a deep re-visioning of what it means to be human. He invites the reader to "flow with the great paradoxes of creation," encouraging us to see that Earth and humans are evolving together as one process, leading us to the divine mystery that radiates from within creation itself. If I could, I would put this important work into thousands of waiting hands. "--Paula D'Arcy, author of Waking Up to This Day and Stars at Night.

“In an age battered by the twin crises of a devastating worldwide pandemic and global climate change, Diarmuid O’Murchu offers us a resource to think through what it means to respond with an empowering spirituality, ecological grounding, and what healing and growth might look like moving forward. Anybody who is tired and weary in the wake of the present moment will take consolation in the insightful, challenging, and hopeful theological reflections Beyond the Pandemic provide to the church and world. This is a book for our time.”- Daniel P. Horan, OFM, Professor of Philosophy, Religious Studies and Theology at Saint Mary’s College in Notre Dame and author of A White Catholic’s Guide to Racism and Privilege

The best-selling author of  Doing Theology in an Evolutionary Way looks to the urgent ecological and spiritual lessons to be learned and acted upon from the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the three years since the onset of COVID-19 we are still reeling from the reality of death and suffering on a massive scale, as well as ongoing economic and social dislocations. And yet, amidst the efforts to recover some lost sense of normality, there remain urgent issues to be addressed. Some of these bear on the ecological consequences of humankind’s unending encroachment on the natural world—one of the underlying factors in this and possible future pandemics. But then there are the spiritual lessons to be learned as well.

 As Diarmuid O’Murchu argues, the pandemic calls for a “reset,” a major shift in human consciousness, in the very ways we see and understand life—or fail to do so.

 Diarmuid O’Murchu is the author of many pioneering books that include Evolutionary Faith, Beyond Original Sin, When the Disciple Comes of Age, and Doing Theology in an Evolutionary Way (all Orbis). He lives in Ireland and speaks throughout the world.