Riven: A Mysticism of Place in Times of Grief
Journal of Contemplative Studies July 23, 2025 Patricia M. Zimmerman
This essay argues that the climate crisis demands a lamentation rooted in the material reality of place rather than escapist romanticism. Drawing on Christian mystics Julian of Norwich, Mechthild of Magdeburg, and John of the Cross, alongside contemporary writers Robert Macfarlane and Annie Dillard, it proposes that their capacity to hold paradoxical truths in real bodies and time offers spiritual practices for confronting ecocide. These figures are presented as poets of apocatastasis, postulants of apophatic energy, and epistemologies of integration, moving beyond metaphor to engage the life-force of particular places.