A Conference on Ecology, Spirituality and Living Economies

June 12-14, 2009
Xavier University, Cincinnati, Ohio

Our moment in time offers humans an urgent challenge:

Get serious about economic models that are more in keeping with Earth’s living systems - what David Korten describes as a “planetary system of community-led local, living economies”

To achieve healthy global interdependence requires seeing economics as a human tool of exchange that must fit within a larger, planetary context.

We can replace current outdated and deadly economic systems with models that are both cutting-edge and as basic as Earth.

Conference aims

• Tap into exciting models and strategies for living economies from visionary thinkers, regional communities, local businesses and grassroots organizations.
• Build connections and relationships with people in the mid-states region to share ideas, develop networks, and learn from each other’s “best practices.”
• Explore the cultural and spiritual transformation needed to make this transition possible.
• Share the joy that building communities brings.

Plenary Speakers

David Korten

David Korten is a visionary proponent of a planetary system of local living economies

Dr. Korten is the author of The Great Turning, When Corporations Rule the World, and The Post Corporate World. He is a co-founder and board chair of Positive Futures Network, which publishes Yes! A Journal of Positive Futures; founder and president of the People-Centered Development Forum; an associate of the International Forum on Globalization and serves on the board of Business Alliance for Local Living Economies. He works to help develop citizen groups working from a shared understanding of the deep problems afflicting our species and a common vision of unrealized possibilities.

Read more about David Korten by visiting www.davidkorten.org

Miriam Therese MacGillis

Dominican sister and co-founder of Genesis Farm, an Earth Literacy Center in northwestern New Jersey

Through her workshops and lectures (over 500 of them so far), she helps people to understand and embody this new understanding of what it means to be human. Miriam is the director of Genesis Farm, a center for education in earth stewardship, sponsored by the Dominican Congregation in affiliation with Global Education Associates.

Read more about Miriam Therese MacGillis by reading this interview

David Orr

Dr. David Orr is Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics at Oberlin College and the University of Vermont

Orr is a scholar, teacher, writer, speaker, and entrepreneur whose work spans fields as diverse as environment and politics, environmental education, campus greening, green building, ecological design, and climate change. He is the author of five books and co-editor of three others. In 1996 he organized the effort to design the Adam Joseph Lewis Center, the first college building in the U.S. powered entirely by sunlight. It is a laboratory in sustainability, training some of the nation’s brightest and most dedicated students for careers in solving environmental problems.

Read more about David Orr by visiting www.oberlin.edu

Sister Paula Gonzalez, SC, PhD

A futurist and environmentalist, Paula Gonzalez has offered over 1700 talks, minicourses and retreats on Learning from Earth, Ecospirituality, Renewable Energy, Climate Change, Sustainable Futures, The Earth Charter and The Future of Religious Life. Since 1980 Paula has constructed two solar buildings modeled on nature’s cyclic processes, along with producing several book chapters, articles and audiotape and videotape programs.