Thomas Berry, C.P., PhD was a Catholic priest of the Passionist order, cultural historian and ecotheologian . Among advocates of "ecospirituality" and the "New Story," he is famous for proposing the idea that a deep understanding of the history and functioning of the evolving universe is a necessary inspiration and guide for our own effective functioning as individuals and as a species. He is considered a leader in the tradition of Teilhard de Chardin.Berry believed that humanity, after generations spent in self-glorification and despoiling the world, is poised to embrace a new role as a vital part of a larger, interdependent “communion of subjects” on earth and in the universe.
Berry said the transformation of humanity’s priorities will not come easily. It requires what he called “the great work” — the title of his last major book — in four institutional realms: the political and legal order; the economic and industrial world; education; and religion.
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9. November 1914 – 1. June 2009