Thomas Berry was born in Greensboro, North Carolina. As a child he experienced a sense of the numinous wonder of nature, which remained a fixture of his spirituality.
After entering a Passionist monastery at the age of twenty, he was later ordained a priest. The experience of living in China in 1948 awakened a lifelong fascination with the religions of Asia.
After returning to America he taught the history of religion at Fordham. But increasingly, through the influence of the Jesuit mystic and scientist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, his interest shifted toward the meaning of human culture within the wider evolutionary unfolding of the universe
With Teilhard he drew wonder from the emergence of human consciousness in the wide history of the cosmos. We were now living in an ecological age in which we must realize our capacity to shape and guide the evolutionary process. This sense of our place in the wider story of the universe called for a new set of values and spiritual consciousness – a project he called the Great Work of our time. It required humility and a deep sense of responsibility for the ethical care of the earth and the fostering of a sustainable future.
The ecological crisis of our time was also a spiritual crisis. Rather than a theologian, he called himself a “geologian.” Berry died on June 1, 2009.
“We are talking only to ourselves. We are not talking to the rivers, we are not listening to the wind and stars. We have broken the great conversation. By breaking that conversation, we have shattered the universe.”
Fr. Thomas Berry, CP
About Thomas Berry Place
Named for geologian and Passionist priest Fr. Thomas Berry, CP (1914-2009), Thomas Berry Place in Jamaica, Queens, NY, is a place of reflection, prayer, forgiveness, eco-spirituality & restorative justice.
