The Wilderness that Speaks

It is Victoria Loorz’s mission to help people not just care for the earth, but to fall in love with it.

What would it look like to move beyond appreciating nature, even past protecting her, to loving her? And realizing, perhaps, that we are already a part of her?

Join us on the Spiritual Wanderlust podcast to learn about:

🔸The forgotten heritage of the Judeo-Christian world and its deep relationship with nature

🔹How to re-wild your spirituality, wherever you are

🔸3 things we need to Unlearn in order to reconnect with the land, other creatures, and ourselves

🔹Victoria’s longstanding friendship with a deer named Mary

🔸How our connection and conversation with nature (and each other) *is* Christ.

Victoria Loorz is an "eco-spiritual director" and co-founder of the Wild Church Network. Her book, Church of the Wild: How Nature Invites Us into the Sacred is a deeply personal invitation for everyone to re-member themselves back into intimate, sacred relationship with the rest of the living world.

From the book’s prologue:

"This is a story about a land where the trees talk and the waters croon and the people fall in love with birds, who love them back. This is a story about an enchanted forest hiding in plain sight, invisible until, somehow, the veil drops—and what was unseen can suddenly be seen. You may catch a glimpse when you cross the threshold on the far edge of the abandoned field, or when, just for a blinking instant, you notice how the brambles of the blackberry bush connect you to everything..."

Learn more about Victoria, the Wild Church movement, and her book at www.victorialoorz.com.

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:34:09

Kelly Deutsch

Hello everyone, and welcome to the Spiritual Wanderlust podcast. I'm Kelly Deutsch and today we have joining us Victoria Lures. Now Victoria is an eco spiritual director and she's the co-founder of the Wild Church Network, which is dedicated to integrating nature and spirituality, which is a lot of what she does and what she's about. Victoria feels most alive when collaborating with mystery and kindred spirits to create opportunities for people to remember themselves back into intimate, sacred relationship with the rest of the living world.

00:00:34:12 - 00:00:49:17

Kelly Deutsch

Today, I'm excited to welcome Victoria to talk about what this wild church movement is all about and perhaps some of her own experience in loving and, being in relationship with nature. So, Victoria, welcome.

00:00:49:19 - 00:00:52:21

Victoria Loorz

Thank you. I'm excited to be here. Kelly. Yeah.

00:00:52:24 - 00:01:01:02

Kelly Deutsch

I wanted to start with a question from your own book. I would like to ask for you to share a little bit about the land who raised you.

00:01:01:19 - 00:01:03:21

Victoria Loorz

that's such a good question, isn't it?

00:01:03:23 - 00:01:04:22

Kelly Deutsch

Love it.

00:01:05:10 - 00:01:28:24

Victoria Loorz

yeah. The book, it's called church of the Wild How Nature Invites Us into the sacred. And, I open the book with a story from my from my teenage years. But I realized that even when we moved a lot, we moved every, I've moved a lot. I'm about to move. It'll be my 47th move and,

00:01:28:26 - 00:02:09:03

Victoria Loorz

Yeah, a lot. And, but everywhere we would move, I would find a little sort of hidden place for me, whether it was in the yard or in the neighborhood in a, you know, an empty lot. Usually lived in suburb kinds of areas. but I was always find sort of a little hidden place. And so it was that that idea of hidden place that was always I didn't have the words for it as far as, that I, that I give it now that I was able to recognize when I wrote the book, like, oh my gosh, this started way before I start to tell my story of that, that that hidden place was

00:02:09:03 - 00:02:38:08

Victoria Loorz

always sacred for me. and so, it's like I was learning about that contemplative life before I had anywhere or any, even, even the words of God or any kind of spiritual words whatsoever. but the land who raised me was, you know, sometimes it was even a little, a little river going down the, what's it called on the end of a street, like the little gully on the.

00:02:38:08 - 00:02:42:03

Victoria Loorz

Oh. That's not the word for it. Like the.

00:02:42:03 - 00:02:42:24

Kelly Deutsch

Yes.

00:02:42:26 - 00:03:12:22

Victoria Loorz

Oh my gosh. Is that right. Yeah. So even just up from people's, from people's the watering their lawn and I would build little, you know mud dams or that kind of thing. So those are the little places they were small little hidden places that that raised me. And I would always find a place like that. And the place that I write about in the beginning of the book is, the place that I had and my middle school and high school years in Thousand Oaks, California.

00:03:12:22 - 00:03:34:12

Victoria Loorz

And it took I knew exactly how to get there. You know, it took a while to get to this particular place. There's something about particularity that's important. It was a particular a place that I always went back to and it overlooked, like the this little canyon that was that was behind our neighborhood. And I created, sacred space.

00:03:34:12 - 00:03:54:27

Victoria Loorz

I had, gone to YMCA camps, and they have this symbol for the a circle around the square and a triangle in the middle. And, I created one of those. And, and then in the middle of the triangle was a cross, and in the middle would be me. I replaced the cross with me in the middle of this, symbol.

00:03:54:29 - 00:04:16:21

Victoria Loorz

And, you know, so every time I went there, I'd sort of fix the, the stones and this and the and, sticks that created this, this symbolic, you know, it was meaningful to me. And, but I would just sit there. I would just be there, and I didn't bring a journal, I just would that was my place to sit and escape.

00:04:16:24 - 00:04:38:26

Victoria Loorz

So that hillside, the sagebrush, the deer that came to visit me once, just once. you know, the birds, the just that place, and those places and all the wherever I lived, I found that that question is something most people can answer. Yes, I've never thought about it.

00:04:38:29 - 00:04:59:07

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah, and I was I was just struck by how, those things that stir in us as children, which we don't really even make much of. It's sometimes takes an entire lifetime to come back around, you know, because we have to go through all the intellectual and I need these specific practices, and we do all these things that we think are very mature and grown up.

00:04:59:07 - 00:05:21:01

Kelly Deutsch

And then eventually, sometimes we make it back to that simple stance of just being in nature and letting the deer or the trees speak to us. And for me, it was I'd get off the school bus. I grew up in the plains of South Dakota, and I get off the school bus, you know, surrounded by wheat fields and just, like, lie in the grass and kind of soak up the sky.

00:05:21:03 - 00:05:31:21

Kelly Deutsch

And, you know, I never thought much of it as a kid, but, you know, once I got to college and we started learning about, like, the sacramental imagination and the rhythm of life with nature and all the things I was like.

00:05:31:24 - 00:05:34:09

Victoria Loorz

Oh, I did that. Like.

00:05:34:11 - 00:05:36:25

Kelly Deutsch

I didn't even know what I had.

00:05:36:27 - 00:05:54:08

Victoria Loorz

That's why I like to use the word remember, because I think it comes natural to humans and little ones when we're little or when our when we have little ones, it comes natural and it's not anything you have to teach. It's something we have to learn from our own selves when we were little and from the little people in our lives.

00:05:54:10 - 00:06:15:03

Victoria Loorz

Yeah, because I think it's just part of being human and is is, is that ease of living within a larger sense of what I now call the larger sense of beloved community. But as as a child, we just sort of naturally, intuitively know that we belong.

00:06:15:05 - 00:06:45:15

Kelly Deutsch

One thing I one of the reasons why I love speaking about nature, especially when we're talking about the spiritual life, is, how easily we transition just from being present in it to recognizing the capital presence in it. And I sometimes have said that, my favorite shortcut to contemplation is wonder. And I'm curious what role wonder has played in your own spirituality or even in the wild church movement?

00:06:45:19 - 00:07:10:28

Victoria Loorz

Big time, big time. I love that wonder I think is at the core of it. And I think that's the part that as children, we just live in a state of wonder all the time. And and that's the tragedy of our culture, that kind of deep wonderment of our souls, you know? but it is actually at the center of wild church for most wild churches, if not all of them.

00:07:11:01 - 00:07:40:25

Victoria Loorz

Is this sense of not even a sense of it is a practice of wandering with an A in wonder, with an O, and so it's going from the center circle in a lot of, a lot of wild churches meet in a circle outside under a tree or something. and a lot of wild churches have an order of service similar to what I do, which is 45 minutes to an hour of it is solo wandering.

00:07:40:27 - 00:08:16:00

Victoria Loorz

And in that wandering you're wondering, you know, like you're you're just open in that sense of awe with intentionality, like even crossing a threshold of leaving this circle when you take that step. It's very intentional. When you take this step, you're opening up your imagination on purpose. You're opening up that sense of awe and wonder and, you know, praise every being that you encounter and introduce yourself and, be open to the reality of Christ that is within all things.

00:08:16:03 - 00:08:49:10

Victoria Loorz

You know, like, we can say that, but to actually live it and practice it as a spiritual practice, I think really is at the core of the of the wild church movement. There's a lot more, you know, that can flow from that. But I would I would go out on a limb and say, that's really, one of the things at the core of the movement is really connecting, you know, remembering, which I love that the, the word religion means that it means legales, you know, ligament, the thing that connects reconnect.

00:08:49:13 - 00:09:15:22

Victoria Loorz

There's something about being human that always needs religion. Like it's just part of being human. And there must we must know at some deep place that we need ways to state to reconnect because we tend to disconnect as part of the the flow, like the, the, the fall is built in. It's not you know, that story is so important because it's part of it's part of it's part of the journey.

00:09:17:14 - 00:09:37:19

Victoria Loorz

and so the reconnecting like I also love the labyrinth, you know, you come, you go straight to the center, you get a glimpse, and then you spend a whole lifetime, you know, wandering around. But right before you go back to the to actually enter the center, you come back to the beginning and you're back at the beginning again going, oh, that's interesting.

00:09:37:22 - 00:09:51:26

Victoria Loorz

Like how much has changed after this lifetime? And here I am back at the beginning or like you even said, you know, like as you go back and, and recognize I did this, I did this contemplative practice when I was three, you know.

00:09:51:28 - 00:09:52:24

Kelly Deutsch

Right.

00:09:52:26 - 00:09:53:25

Victoria Loorz

Yeah.

00:09:53:28 - 00:10:21:12

Kelly Deutsch

Absolutely. And I love I love the etymology of that word religion and the root of it because to reconnect, that is something I mean, so many of us are like, I can't do religion like I'm out, you know, like maybe spirituality and might believe in something. But what religion has come to stand for in all of its rigidity, instead of that, it's something that reconnects us to ourselves, to this world and universe that we're in, to the divine.

00:10:22:06 - 00:10:24:07

Victoria Loorz

to one another, to our community.

00:10:24:13 - 00:10:25:21

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. And in that sense.

00:10:25:21 - 00:10:27:27

Victoria Loorz

Practice of reconnecting.

00:10:27:29 - 00:10:46:17

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. I was just going to say, in that sense, every human person has to find some sort of religion. You know, like you said, it's part of being human. And I remember the first time I lived in Kansas for a while, and I went to a Ku basketball game, which I didn't know that that was like a big deal.

00:10:46:17 - 00:11:06:28

Kelly Deutsch

But if anybody listening knows, like college basketball, Ku takes their basketball very seriously. And I remember going to this game and growing up Catholic, their game struck me as a liturgy. But I felt like a Protestant at a Catholic Mass because I didn't know, like when to stand, when to sit, when you cheer, what thing? Like, do people have like a little, like, missile that they're following along?

00:11:06:28 - 00:11:23:24

Kelly Deutsch

Like, I didn't know, but it was so interesting, you know, because people would just, like, give themselves so fully to this, this liturgy, this game, this thing that brought people together. And I'm like, that's that's the human longing, right? We we need to reconnect somehow.

00:11:23:26 - 00:11:44:19

Victoria Loorz

And I think people are rejecting religion because it's not holding up to what it's supposed to be. You know, it's become it's become known as almost the opposite of that. You know, I call it my book decision. You know, disconnection us versus them. You're in or you're out, you know, and, and yeah, it's it's the exact opposite of what it's meant to be.

00:11:44:24 - 00:12:10:06

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah, yeah. It's true. I wanted to take a minute for people who are unfamiliar with kind of the wild church movement to ask how you would describe what this both the church of the wild like in your book, but also this wider movement, what it's all about because it's it's more than just like we're taking church outside, like we're going to have our services in the park or in you know, nature somewhere.

00:12:10:06 - 00:12:13:18

Kelly Deutsch

So how is it more than that? What? Yeah. How would you describe it?

00:12:13:21 - 00:12:34:06

Victoria Loorz

Yeah. And that exact thing happened, especially at the beginning of the pandemic, when it was starting to open up a little. And churches could meet outside. We would be contacted by churches saying, you know, where do you plug in the, you know, the, the amplifier and where do you put all the, the benches? And we would say, like, that's not what this is like.

00:12:34:06 - 00:13:00:01

Victoria Loorz

You can do that. But it's not wild how we've been experiencing wild church. And so church of the wild is church of the wild. And so it's that, that preposition of versus in like, yes, the location is outside of the, you know, the, the village, underneath an oak tree or in a park. but it's really church of the wild.

00:13:00:01 - 00:13:37:12

Victoria Loorz

It's listening. It's it's developing and practicing practices, spiritual practices together that reconnect us to the sacred, that is, that is already present in, in the larger, like I say, larger beloved community beyond our own species, even the, the you know, if you read any of the the Psalms they talk about, let the earth be glad. You know, there's a lot of there's a lot of psalms about there's actually it's all throughout our our ancient stories is this deep, intimate connection to the rest of the living world as sacred.

00:13:37:15 - 00:13:42:21

Victoria Loorz

And yet we sort of like metaphor, as it were. I did when I was a pastor. And, you.

00:13:42:21 - 00:13:44:11

Kelly Deutsch

Know, why do you think that is?

00:13:44:13 - 00:14:09:01

Victoria Loorz

Yeah, there's I think there's a whole history around it. but but what we're trying to do is create these practices to reconnect us, not just to, well, on one level, to the sacred, who is present in all things, to Christ, who is present in all things. And and that means all things, not not just other other humans.

00:14:09:25 - 00:14:41:22

Victoria Loorz

but but also it reconnects us to place as as sacred, reconnects us to place as a place of a larger place of belonging, a larger sense of, kin, kindred connection and responsibility and and community. and and so, you know, like my, my journey was not just from within the church. I was a pastor for many years and left for seven years, completely left going to church, left being a pastor.

00:14:41:24 - 00:15:17:09

Victoria Loorz

And in the seven years I started a, nonprofit with my son, around youth in the climate crisis, because there's so many young people who are growing up knowing that this is a crisis, knowing that their generations are the ones that are going to suffer the most and who want to do something about it. So, entering into that in those seven years and then coming back to the church in a, in a way that that integrated both of these, both of these, parts of my life that, that are important, but we're missing each other.

00:15:17:09 - 00:15:43:06

Victoria Loorz

And so in the environmental movement, you know, you could you could talk about that spiritual, communities or, you know, getting the religious communities involved in the advocacy programs. And, and if you're in the church, you can talk about, oh, you know, it's a beautiful the the environment is a beautiful environment for our spiritual work that we're doing inside of this building or inside of our little human, construct.

00:15:44:12 - 00:16:11:00

Victoria Loorz

but or or will, you know, churches over the last 20 years have been doing a lot of, reducing their carbon footprint and those kind of sustainability acts, which are good. And I and I hope they continue. but what hasn't that I hadn't experienced is just an integration of our spirituality in the context of and in relationship with the rest of the living world.

00:16:11:00 - 00:16:47:06

Victoria Loorz

And that and that's reverence obviously impacts the planet. You know, by decentralizing this planet, we are able to abuse it in order to abuse or or colonize or take over or, oppress another. We need to have the we need to sacrifice them. We need to have them, be othered and, in order to even do that work, that sort of evil work of, abuse, really.

00:16:47:29 - 00:17:09:23

Victoria Loorz

like the General Secretariat said last week when the new IPCC report came out, he was just like, this is this is this is abuse. This is arson of our own planet. And it really is that that intense that you have to do sacred lies the other in order to do it. You, you you don't you're not going to set your mother on fire.

00:17:09:24 - 00:17:59:22

Victoria Loorz

You know, you're going to have to, you know, dehumanize your mother and, and create a story of toxicity or whatever you want to do in order to, treat her poorly. And so that's what we've done systematically as a, as an empire, as empire nations for hundreds and hundreds of thousands of years, actually. And so that restoring that severance is, is what this the core of the wild church movement is, is that this this severance not only obviously, has led to the destruction of our planet, it's also really impacted our own spirituality, our own sense of the sacred, our own connection with, with God, our own connection with the with the divine.

00:17:59:24 - 00:18:24:24

Victoria Loorz

And so it's not like, you know, doing church out in the wild makes it really pretty. And, you know, like, we do it every Easter and it's nice to watch the sunrise. it is nice, but it's the, the, the purpose in it is that we're restoring something or remembering ourselves back into this larger story that is a sacred story and that we are needed.

00:18:24:27 - 00:19:10:22

Victoria Loorz

It's like the, you know, the creation groaning, like the creation groans, waiting for us to restore our relationship and, and live up to our part of, of the evolutionary reality of life. You know, it's not even a religious concept. It's a life concept. It's a life, not even concept. It's a life reality. It's the way life works. And so when we when we take ourselves out or pretend to take ourselves out of that interconnected hole that that functions through this mycelial, you know, sort of like not just physical connection, where the air we breathe, obviously, is just because of this tree and the oceans that what we what we exhale, they inhale and give us

00:19:10:22 - 00:19:38:21

Victoria Loorz

what we need. And we we the food system is all by one being sacrificing their life for another being to live like it's a just a very interconnected, ecological system that we are part of. But when we pretend that we're not part of it and we act as if our, our part of it is the only part that matters, and we treat the rest of the parts just as resources to serve us, we're breaking a sacred bond.

00:19:39:09 - 00:20:03:14

Victoria Loorz

and it's it's, it's a serious severance that needs to be repented of. It needs to be grieved, deeply grieved, and, and, and an open, in an open hearted way, say, how can I be a part of, of restoring this, broken conversation as, Thomas Berry talks about?

00:20:03:17 - 00:20:28:21

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah, I was thinking, about all the things that we need to unlearn in order to be a part of to really do this reconnecting work to remember, as you say, and I like how you pointed out in your book that even just calling the world like natural resources, as if they're there for us to use and exploit and, you.

00:20:28:21 - 00:20:30:12

Victoria Loorz

Know, like property. Yeah.

00:20:30:15 - 00:20:34:19

Kelly Deutsch

Right. As if it's all here explicitly for us.

00:20:34:19 - 00:20:35:03

Victoria Loorz

Right?

00:20:35:08 - 00:20:58:26

Kelly Deutsch

That just seems, I mean, it's like hubris almost, you know, just like the audacity of us to think, you know, like, even if you were to think theologically that humans are the crown of creation, which might have a question mark about it. But even if you were to think that. Yeah, it's like how we are still so clearly part of this, of this web of this cycle, as you mentioned.

00:20:58:28 - 00:21:05:24

Kelly Deutsch

And I'm curious if there are other things that occur to you that we need to unlearn in order.

00:21:05:24 - 00:21:07:14

Victoria Loorz

To that.

00:21:07:16 - 00:21:08:17

Kelly Deutsch

We reconnect.

00:21:08:17 - 00:21:32:23

Victoria Loorz

That's such a huge there's a huge list, so huge that all the keys are hitting my brain at the same time. Sure. let me think. Well, I mean, even just taking that, Robin, while Kimmerer talks about pronouns, you know that we don't have, pronouns for those in the natural world, they're generally it. And so just changing.

00:21:32:23 - 00:22:04:00

Victoria Loorz

She she proposes in her language to calling, others that are not human key. Instead of he or she is key and plural of that is kin, which is cool. And so that's that's in her, Shinobi language. Those are the words that they, those are the pronouns that they use. And it's so something as simple as that, like, Robert MacFarlane and many others talk about how language doesn't only sort of like describe reality, it creates reality.

00:22:04:03 - 00:22:26:25

Victoria Loorz

And so just by changing that little, that little bit of unlearning, like, for example, I, I sort of learned this when a friend of mine, an eco theologian, Lisa Day Hill, we were we were canoeing once in the LA River of all places, which is like a, hilarious place to try to canoe because it's concrete.

00:22:27:13 - 00:22:47:00

Victoria Loorz

but but it's sort of like being rewild it a bit. And there were heron there and, and lots of other birds and a mama duck with her babies. And anyway, and I saw this heron, I said, oh, look at him going there, you know. So I had, I had moved from, you know, the it's, pronoun to my default was him.

00:22:47:03 - 00:23:17:08

Victoria Loorz

She's like, how do you not see him? And I, I was like, well, I don't know. Why am I saying him, you know, what is that? And so I intentionally call all others she until I know that there. Okay. And, and so that just that intentionality make creates an I vow possibility even just with, you know, a little spider, it just sort of creates an I vow relationship with this little spider to say, oh, look, she's in the corner.

00:23:17:11 - 00:23:49:23

Victoria Loorz

Like just just that shifts and and unlearning of of habitual way of speaking within a culture that is, that is created because we have created these relationships, to discretize the other and so to act to, to read sacred lies, this, this beautiful living, sacrament of, of life that all beings are just just something that's simple, can can be pretty powerful.

00:23:49:25 - 00:23:58:26

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. It's interesting because it it's almost like we need to read Sacred Lies, Our vision, because it's like the world is already sacred. We just need to wake up to the fact that.

00:23:58:27 - 00:24:06:16

Victoria Loorz

It's our interpretation. It's our, habitual, worldview. Yeah. Which is what worldview is. Right.

00:24:06:18 - 00:24:29:06

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. So much. It's Yeah. Crazy how much objectifying others, whether it is the planet or other people. How much easier as you were mentioning before. Like we have to sacrifice first before we abuse like other you know, that just for our own psyches to function, we need to think that we're like doing something to a thing. Yeah.

00:24:29:06 - 00:24:58:11

Kelly Deutsch

This isn't this isn't bad. This isn't evil. I'm not an evil person. I'm just, you know, it reminds me of, You said somewhere that how we treat the earth is how we treat women and people of color. And I feel like the connection is very much in that, in that, our objectification of other. It is people of color, of of women, of, people with disabilities or the planet itself, the creatures around us.

00:24:59:12 - 00:25:45:11

Victoria Loorz

That's, it's that's it's that worldview of domination, the that is at the core of all of those objectification. And it's not saying, you know, that deforestation is as bad as, or that, you know, slavery, human slavery is as bad as deforestation or whatever. I'm not saying that there's a certain level of what's worse. I'm saying that at the core of all of these issues that we are facing, or that the veil is being torn, on so many levels in our culture right now to see where we've been, in out of alignment of relationship in so many levels at the core of that is this, this worldview of domination.

00:25:45:13 - 00:26:30:13

Victoria Loorz

And it's this, you know, that a certain small segment of the, of the human society decides they are the important ones, that everyone else is there to serve them. And it's been part of human culture forever. And it's something that I think is really needing. It has to dissolve, you know, for, for, for, for war. That is that is happening right now for deforestation, that's happening for, you know, the way that we are, you know, the way that we do agriculture that, that that ruins the soil, you know, like there's just so many every all the levels are being, looked at now or, or there's a fierceness in defending the, the way

00:26:30:13 - 00:26:53:08

Victoria Loorz

where, you know, because we don't want to give up that domination and or that dominance. because it means we have to give up some of our privileges that were never ours in the first place, you know? Yeah. It's like these are not. These are privileges un unfairly taken, un rightly taken like violently taken even. And so surrendering privileges does hurt.

00:26:53:08 - 00:27:40:14

Victoria Loorz

It's doesn't feel good. You know, there's a lot more that's coming. Yeah. That's that and I'm, I'm as guilty as anybody. You know, I still drive a car. I live inside of a you know, it's like I live in a culture that, is based on this kind of, non reciprocity. You know, it's the opposite of what, more Earth based peoples, indigenous peoples throughout all of history, not not just in North America right now, but if you go back far enough in all of our ancestries, there were people who were very deeply connected with the land and, and they understood that their place in that, that they play a very that we as

00:27:40:14 - 00:27:59:12

Victoria Loorz

humans play a very important role in the in the functioning of the system. You know, it's a lot of people say, you know, if humans were gone, then the rest of the world will rejoice. Like, I'm not sure that's true. You know, I think we play an important role. We just have forgotten that. And we just are not not playing our part.

00:27:59:12 - 00:28:24:17

Victoria Loorz

We're not, we're bullies right now. Yeah, but bullies can be, you know, that's that's where I don't give up. Bullies can, but can be, turn their hearts. We have we also have this deep capacity to love. And, I just read something this week that makes me so happy. It was somebody wrote a report or, study.

00:28:24:19 - 00:28:46:05

Victoria Loorz

He looked more deeply into Darwin's work. And you know how we sort of, in our empire culture call it survival of the fittest. It's very competitive. It's very much, you know, dog eat dog, that kind of idea. But that's not what he was trying to say. What this report is saying, it's it's really what he was saying is the survival of the kindest.

00:28:46:23 - 00:29:13:19

Victoria Loorz

I love that so much. It's like what you're seeing in care right now is how they are. People are banding together. They're taking care of each other. You know, they're they're not being taken over as quickly as the as the Russian troops thought. The Russian leaders at least thought, I'm not sure the troops thought anything. because we have this deep human capacity to band together in community and to care for one another.

00:29:13:22 - 00:29:39:06

Victoria Loorz

And we're all here because our ancestors cared for one another and made sure we, our ancestors, survived. so, like this kindred, connection is the way life works. It's not a religious idea. Although every religion, including my own, is based. You know, Jesus said himself, love your neighbor as you love God, love your neighbor as yourself, everything else.

00:29:39:06 - 00:30:00:27

Victoria Loorz

And, you know, midrash from that. it's the end. Who is our neighbor? Like the whole thing is about who's our neighbor. It's bigger than that. It's bigger than that. It's bigger than our than our church. It's bigger than our family. It's bigger than our people that look like us. It's bigger than our species. It's. It's the whole living system.

00:30:02:01 - 00:30:33:19

Kelly Deutsch

That reciprocity and connection that we have with with this whole system, with our community, with, kind of the, the kindred creatures around us. it makes me think of, well, I remember you saying once that you want to help people, not just take care of the earth, but fall in love with it and part of falling in love is recognizing that there is a reciprocity, that it's not just like it's not necessarily a parental love.

00:30:33:19 - 00:31:09:02

Kelly Deutsch

You know, where it's like, I'm here to be a custodian and make sure that you survive. It's like, no, no, we're we're here. We're peers together. Which the other thing that came to mind is kind of that, the tendency to be this, like white Messiah in mission work, right? You know, and, you know, it's like I am here to help you, you know, and and just help like, people often go on, like, mission trips or whatever, being very well-intentioned but not recognizing how much damage that can cause when it's like, clearly I am the one in power here.

00:31:09:02 - 00:31:18:14

Kelly Deutsch

And let me, like, deign to offer you some assistance instead of having that peer to peer like we're we're all in this together, like.

00:31:18:17 - 00:31:19:10

Victoria Loorz

It's.

00:31:19:13 - 00:31:28:23

Kelly Deutsch

Who's to say that, like, you know, in ten years or even just, you know, by some stroke of fate that I wouldn't be in your exact position.

00:31:29:15 - 00:31:30:12

Victoria Loorz

exactly.

00:31:30:15 - 00:31:31:21

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah.

00:31:31:24 - 00:32:13:17

Victoria Loorz

Yeah. And that's. And I have even said sort of in my work in the church, you know, 40 years ago, I was, worked with World Vision and, and my project was to help people move from that Dominion theology into stewardship theology. You know, that we are here to care for the other. Now it's more like to move from stewardship, which is that one up kind of thing into relationship, you know, into actual that like you said, sacred reciprocity relationship and falling in love is absolutely like it's wrapping while Kima again talks about this and I experienced it for myself, like moving from I love, you know, for me, I fell in love with these

00:32:13:17 - 00:32:36:06

Victoria Loorz

deer that live in, in the neighborhood. And, and my son was the one to say, you know, after a while when they kept coming to my house and the mama would bring the mamas still, we'll bring the babies here to sort of I watch over them while they go grazing, and then they'll come back and, and my sons and I was like, oh, I need to give them a little treat.

00:32:36:06 - 00:32:51:08

Victoria Loorz

You know, I have apples for when it's not apple season. We have some apple trees on the yard and I'll give them. I'll cut up the little apples and give them the apples. And my son said one day, you know, like, how do you know they're not just coming to see you? and I was like, oh, right.

00:32:51:08 - 00:33:07:22

Victoria Loorz

This is a relationship. That's two way, you know, I'll come and they'll just lay outside of my window. And it's not about, you know, getting the apples. They're just they feel safe. They're they like looking in the window at me. I like looking in the window at them. I'll go outside, you know, and just kind of talk to them.

00:33:07:22 - 00:33:38:18

Victoria Loorz

And I feel that their presence is a is a gift to me. but yes, seeing, seeing that this tree cares that I pay attention to her. You know, it's it's that's one of that unlearning, you know, it's like, oh, here's an unlearning is, is this fear of anathema anthropomorphizing with, you know, it's this fear of saying, well, I don't know how that deer feels like it's true, but you don't know how your spouse feels.

00:33:38:18 - 00:34:01:03

Victoria Loorz

Really. You don't know how your child feels. You think you do right? But you're not right. You know, all you can do is enter into relationship and listen. And so it's an invitation in that falling in love to listen, to pay attention and listening is a contemplative practice. And so like there's an animal communicator. I love Anna Breytenbach.

00:34:01:06 - 00:34:22:11

Victoria Loorz

She's in, Britain back. She is in South Africa and works with the sanctuaries there with animals that are, you know, rescued from poaching and whatnot and beautiful work that she does. And, and I listen to a whole bunch of podcasts with her because I love her work. There's a there's a little documentary about her you can find on the internet.

00:34:22:14 - 00:34:53:07

Victoria Loorz

And, and her work is amazing. She's, you know, actually communicates with these, with these animals and her how to she's like, anyone can do this. And basically she's describing precisely centering prayer, precisely contemplative prayer. It is what it is. It's emptying of your own agenda and receiving receiving from the other, you know, from and and that the divine is part of that, that reciprocity.

00:34:54:13 - 00:34:56:17

Victoria Loorz

I don't know where I was going with that, but.

00:34:56:20 - 00:35:21:09

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah, but it reminds me, one of the big ahas for my partner, Brandon was when he realized, not just like the subjectivity of like, another tree looking back, but of, like, the divine experiencing the world as that tree or as that deer like God gets to experience the world as Kelly or as Victoria.

00:35:21:11 - 00:35:22:03

Victoria Loorz

And loves that.

00:35:22:06 - 00:35:36:07

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. And that's such a powerful and kind of mind blowing thing to recognize, especially when we get so easily self-centered on just like what's happening in our brains, you know, in living from kind of the neck up.

00:35:36:29 - 00:36:02:20

Victoria Loorz

but then I would add to that it's, it's the relationality. So it's not just, you know, God experiencing the world through my eyes, but I think there's something like, spiritually real and powerful that is the presence of Christ in that relationality, in that connection that, that I call conversations that the Gospel of John calls conversation.

00:36:03:29 - 00:36:27:11

Victoria Loorz

it's it's the it's not that that tree is God. It's that the, the the presence of Christ is in that tree, that Christ is within that tree, and Christ is in within me. And as we connect, as we have conversation, therein lies the presence of Christ. It's in relationship like relationship is at the core of all things love.

00:36:27:13 - 00:36:55:03

Victoria Loorz

God is love. Like what do we mean by that? Like it's not just a bumper sticker, like it's actual the way life works. Yeah. And the way a river works, the way, forest works, the way, you know, all species work is, is the presence of love and care for one another. in that connective, that like action, the action of connectivity is the presence of of God.

00:36:55:28 - 00:37:27:03

Victoria Loorz

Yeah. So there's another unlearning of, from sort of like our noun based culture, you know, where we need to noun ify everything. We need to identify things by their nouns. that's the way our culture is. That's where languages. It's, it's like 70% nouns, but but more Earth based cultures are 70% verbs. And so their whole orientation is around the connections between where our orientation is, the things that are being connected.

00:37:27:03 - 00:37:47:05

Victoria Loorz

And so our focus is on the things. And so we have a thing based culture. But those cultures that have, you know, so I think that's some of the unlearning is like, how do we see the connections between as, as the, as the, you know, at the, at the very least, the process of risk, realizing. But it's the way life works.

00:37:47:05 - 00:37:50:15

Victoria Loorz

You know, even quantum physicist get that.

00:37:50:18 - 00:38:11:27

Kelly Deutsch

Yes. Yes. It made me think of my my favorite translation of the word namaste is the divine spark in me, you know, vows to or recognizes the divine spark in you. And it's not just like I'm divine and your divine, but like that exchange, that flow between that conversation. Like you say, that's that's where the divine is.

00:38:12:00 - 00:38:36:01

Victoria Loorz

Yes, yes. And it's it's more of an action. I think just unlearning that noun orientation that creates such, you know, like I remember early in my, in my 20s, I knew it's like what was my image of God? I would get stuck on that. Like, I know God's not some white guy with a long beard in the sky.

00:38:36:01 - 00:38:58:18

Victoria Loorz

I know that, but what is God like? I couldn't I couldn't put my finger on the noun ness of God. And so it made it made me uncomfortable all the time. I mean, I prayed and I did all the things, but I was always had a little bit of discomfort, you know, and, and I just kind of went, okay, God's a mystery.

00:38:58:20 - 00:39:26:04

Victoria Loorz

It's not very satisfying, but okay. It's a mystery. I don't, you know, it's beyond my weight and my ability to know. But now it's not like any of those questions are answered. They're just not. The questions are just like, not important. Like, it's just like God is much more of a of a ver, much more of a relating, a relationship being, you know, a way of being in the world and, a way of connecting.

00:39:26:04 - 00:39:46:08

Victoria Loorz

I get why we want to make God, now, because it's easier to imagine a relationship with with another like that. But it takes it. It takes God as, like this other thing that's not part of this world. And it's, you know, it's not meant to do that, I don't think. But it in effect, what is what happens.

00:39:46:10 - 00:40:07:17

Victoria Loorz

It's kind of like the same as buildings, church buildings that are built generally without windows. And if there are, they're stained glass. It's like it's sort of unintentionally at least saying what's holy is in here and out there is not, you know, it doesn't say it explicitly, but you sort of get that idea that this is what's holy, what we're doing in here.

00:40:07:19 - 00:40:21:13

Victoria Loorz

And, you know, what damage does that do to our relationship with with everything else out there, you know, the people that live next door, much less the forest that are beyond the the city. Yeah.

00:40:21:16 - 00:40:29:14

Kelly Deutsch

It's hard when we don't have concrete terms for spiritual things. And I think that's.

00:40:29:14 - 00:40:31:28

Victoria Loorz

Oh, hi. They are.

00:40:32:01 - 00:40:59:03

Kelly Deutsch

Your. Is this where is this Mary or was that in your last place? Oh my God, this is my Mary. For those of you who aren't watching on video, we just saw the deer Mary right outside Victoria's window and it's delightful. She's coming to join us. sorry. Separate question. That's totally fine, but, I, I kind of want to hear a little bit more about how you met Mary and Martha.

00:40:59:05 - 00:41:29:18

Victoria Loorz

Oh, okay. Well, this is, Let's see. So when I moved here, I was I had already had about 3 to 5 years earlier, I guess about three years earlier when I moved here, I had an experience in the Rocky Mountains, in the foothills, the Rocky Mountains, with three days in a row, mule deer, doe, in my presence, laid down like right in front of me is buckled her front legs and her back legs.

00:41:29:18 - 00:42:01:13

Victoria Loorz

It was just like this divine moment. And just to kind of, and telling the story is something I was going to say before about that divine presence in this relationship. You know, it's not just conceptual, like there's something real about, you know, the first day that this happened, actually all three days, it was a different version of, when I left, just sitting there with this, these dogs, who laid down and I just kind of sat down with them for, you know, half hour, an hour.

00:42:01:19 - 00:42:33:26

Victoria Loorz

And when I left, I heard within me that voice that I know now is as the voice of God say, I'm with you always. And I knew somehow it wasn't just like this, this external God out there speaking to me. It had something to do with this deer. There was some kind of something involving her that I was able to hear the voice of God, you know, so hard, so, so hard to talk about things like this.

00:42:33:26 - 00:42:50:27

Victoria Loorz

But. Yeah. And then I sort of pursued after that, I like, does this happen all the time? I was looking at forums. I was talking to people that live there and nobody had heard of it. And, and every time I'd see a deer, I'd like, stop my car. I'm like, oh, I'm the Deer Whisperer now, you know, like the deer gonna totally come to me.

00:42:50:27 - 00:43:08:27

Victoria Loorz

And, absolutely. That is not what happened. Every time I'd go out to do, you know, intentional, wild church kinds of things with people. Everybody else would see deer but me and stuff like that. So for three years, I just finally gave up, you know, it's like, all right, I'm trying to make this happen. This is not going to happen.

00:43:09:00 - 00:43:38:11

Victoria Loorz

But when I moved into this house, I moved from California up to Washington State. had sort of forgotten about, you know, pursuing that. And, but the deer moved into the house, the, when I went to return the, the van, the moving van that night, it was dark, and I ran out the front door and almost tripped over a deer, this deer that was lying at the bottom of my stairs and, just immediately started sobbing like, oh my gosh, I can't believe this happening.

00:43:38:11 - 00:44:02:14

Victoria Loorz

This deer that I've been pursuing for years is now coming to me. And, of course, people that live in this neighborhood are like, yeah, yeah, deer all. But a few. So that was the fall by the spring. You know, I sort of I didn't really identify particularly with any of them. You know, they were just like exciting to see deer in my neighborhood.

00:44:02:16 - 00:44:28:15

Victoria Loorz

But this one particular deer who I ended up naming Mary, she came this one day and was laying down. I was on my front porch and she laid down right, you know, 15ft away from me. And, and I noticed that she was particularly just tired and, and then I noticed that she was, like, licking, where she had given birth.

00:44:28:22 - 00:44:54:10

Victoria Loorz

And so there was still sort of like, placenta goo and, you know, like, she was still she just had her babies that day somewhere and was coming in my yard to rest. And that's when I had this apple that I was eating. And I took a slice of the apple, and I just walked toward her a little walk down my stairs and put it out to her, and she got up and came over and took the apple from my from my hand, something she never did again.

00:44:54:12 - 00:45:20:20

Victoria Loorz

And, but it was just like, oh my gosh. Like, she's she's listening to me. She's, you know, and the next day she brought her little newborn fawns into my yard and I got to meet them and, you know, I was like, mind blown. and, yeah. So then that, like, a few weeks later, one of the fonts didn't make it.

00:45:20:25 - 00:45:40:25

Victoria Loorz

And so the remaining one, that's when she started bringing that little one here and that I named Margaret. I named her Martin, and she was, you know, just kind of digging the dirt. She was still like, the little one was excited to come here. She knew exactly where to lay in the garden right outside my window. And, so I got to know these little ones, and.

00:45:40:27 - 00:46:05:28

Victoria Loorz

And now I know everybody in the neighborhood. And when there's somebody new, I know, and, the other little one. Honey, her name is Marley. She's got a broken leg and not doing good. And, so it's just like, these are relationships, you know? What do they mean? I don't know, they mean the the. This is a mama, and I'm a mama, and we have a relationship in this neighborhood.

00:46:05:28 - 00:46:23:16

Victoria Loorz

Like, what does your child mean? You know? Okay, it's, sometimes we can kind of objectify others as sort of, like, soul guides or something like that. I can. We might learn things we do. We learn things from each other, but it's relationship.

00:46:23:19 - 00:46:42:19

Kelly Deutsch

And I think anybody, or at least most people who have any kind of pet have learned those kinds of things. I, I read something online a few months ago that said something like having a dog is like living with your best friend, but you don't speak the same language. And I thought that was just yeah, I was like, that's it.

00:46:42:22 - 00:46:46:14

Kelly Deutsch

You know, like perfect. We love each other so much. And there's but.

00:46:46:15 - 00:47:12:11

Victoria Loorz

You do communicate. There's definitely conversations there through touch. There through, tone there through all the things that the people that have that speak the same language use, except for that 7%. That's actually words, you know. So even in human communication, only 7% of it, as social scientists have told us, is is the language itself. And so it's really not that much of a stretch.

00:47:12:11 - 00:47:34:15

Victoria Loorz

But that's some of that unlearning that assumption that we we don't know what that deer is saying. You know, we don't. She has a totally different you know, I, I would chastise her parenting for leaving her little one for so long. You know, my mom would. Who is staying with me? That would be like Vicky. They're deer. They know what they're doing.

00:47:34:17 - 00:47:59:05

Kelly Deutsch

Yes. Oh, so it's so beautiful to be able to be surrounded by such incredible nature. You're you're up in Washington. I live down in Oregon, and I feel like this area of the country, I mean, you can barely take a step without, like, you know, it's, When I first moved here a few years ago, I was like, this is, like, aggressively verdant.

00:47:59:12 - 00:48:22:18

Kelly Deutsch

It's just, like, bursting out of every surface. And, you know, it's just very intensely green. But I'm curious what words or suggestions you would have for those who live in the city and don't have this kind of nature just bursting out of every surface, or have deer that visit their yard right now, did they do this work of reconnecting, with the sacred world?

00:48:22:23 - 00:48:48:02

Victoria Loorz

Yes, absolutely. I think a couple of things. One, to just not to just, say something about living up here. There's something about being, definitely more connected. And I get to see fuzzy little baby fawns, but also I get to see the cougar come in. I get to see the baby fawn being the Cougars dinner. I get to see the fans with the broken leg.

00:48:48:02 - 00:49:12:12

Victoria Loorz

I get to see, you know, first time I drove to a place, east of Portland in Oregon, I was looking at a house down there, and I had to pull the car over three times to cry because you can see the deforestation in a way, and you can see the trucks going by with, like, huge, you know, trees, in the back of it and in.

00:49:12:12 - 00:49:44:19

Victoria Loorz

But I lived in LA, you know, it's all concrete and you sort of forget. And so there's a bit of, you know, broken heartedness the that you also get up here, which is actually a gift because life is life is heartbreaking. but when, you know, when I lived in LA and people that live in very urban areas, nature, we are part of nature first of all.

00:49:44:19 - 00:50:19:24

Victoria Loorz

So it's not something, you know, I mean, sure, the more wild you can get that's not been, domesticated and tamed and, and used as a natural resource by humans. there is, there is an emergent of that that is, that is like life changing. but there's spiders in your shower, there's stars every night. There's rain that comes in the in the springtime, there's, you know, the little the gutters.

00:50:19:24 - 00:50:42:12

Victoria Loorz

That was what I was looking for before the there's there's the rivers that go down your gutters from, you know, people, watering their lawn. The water is the same water that ends up in the ocean. You know, these, even a domesticated, garden that you've that you've grown yourself in the backyard is, is a connection with, with, with the natural world.

00:50:42:14 - 00:51:12:19

Victoria Loorz

All of this is is part and even just the, you know, going to the LA River, that's all concrete and being heartbroken by that and and seeing the little places of rewilding, that are happening in, in little, small hidden places, you know, it's like it's everywhere. It's even the, the my mom grew up, as a child, Lake Erie and Cleveland, when it was like, you could throw a match in and it would, it would blow up.

00:51:12:21 - 00:51:48:24

Victoria Loorz

And now Lake Erie is, you know, vibrant alive Lake again. but even just being close to the, the desecration can be a gift of, like, your grief, your tears, your your your, crying, groaning with them is a gift. you know, just like if you are, heartbroken and nobody notices, like, that doesn't feel good, you know, just giving, giving the honor of, of love for all others right outside your door.

00:51:48:27 - 00:52:02:26

Victoria Loorz

You know, the dandelion growing in between the cracks kind of thing. Like it's it's just as much a connection with, with the alive world as being in the Rocky Mountains or up here in Washington.

00:52:02:29 - 00:52:05:03

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. And having the ice to see.

00:52:05:05 - 00:52:07:22

Victoria Loorz

It's

00:52:07:24 - 00:52:34:02

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. And there's something beautiful about not only having those eyes to see, but in, in welcoming nature, whether you have, you know, a potted plant in your house or, you know, you have room for a garden or any of those things, because it is I mean, it's fascinating how science has shown you know, like what a massive impact it has on our bodies, which, you know, to me, makes it just abundantly clear how much we're made to be in nature and in union with nature.

00:52:35:16 - 00:52:52:15

Kelly Deutsch

but it can be difficult. I mean, especially I don't know if it's in particular for, you know, how a made or just the fact that I grew up amidst the fields if I'm in a city for too long, you know, originally I lived in Portland and I after being there for about eight months, I was like, I don't know if I can do this anymore.

00:52:52:15 - 00:53:09:09

Kelly Deutsch

You know, it's just so densely packed and I'm like, I need some more space. I need some more green. I need, and so it is, I feel like for a lot of us, such a, a tension of like, I, my soul feels more alive when I have space to see, like.

00:53:09:11 - 00:53:35:05

Victoria Loorz

And that's real. Yeah. And that's real. And that's, the more sort of sensitive you become, the more you, Now there's more deer here and they're chasing each other. the more you long for that. you know, just like any contemplative practice, you know, if you have too much noise and not enough silence. but it's the same thing.

00:53:35:05 - 00:54:02:01

Victoria Loorz

I think the more that you are sensitized to the sacred reality, you know, it's like one of the things that was a mind blower for me was that the word for wilderness in Hebrew is by mid bar, mid bar. And that means if you look it up in the lexicon, the first definition is the land or the, the organ which speaks, the second definition is wilderness.

00:54:02:03 - 00:54:33:05

Victoria Loorz

And so God's sending every, every spiritual eater, the whole people of Israel into the wilderness, isn't just like some punishment. You know, how we've, like, interpreted it. It's like a gift to listen, to be immersed before you go into some promised land, to be immersed in listening to the sacred speak through the through all of the beings that are that are not domesticated and haven't been tamed.

00:54:33:19 - 00:54:56:23

Victoria Loorz

who are who are, you know, just connected. Just just let the earth be glad. Like, just let it just allow that. Just be in that presence. Reconnecting. So it's it's deep in our tradition. And, so there is something real about kind of like the deeper you go in, in recognizing that, the more you know, you need you need that space.

00:54:56:23 - 00:55:15:20

Victoria Loorz

And wherever you make, you know, create that. Some people just, like, have to plants in their house, you know, it just there's something real about that, that spiritual journey of reconnection that that you that you need more because you're being you feel your own soul coming back.

00:55:15:22 - 00:55:33:05

Kelly Deutsch

Yes, yes. And I like how you tied that also to contemplative life because I feel like that's so, such a common experience. You know, when we get a taste of it and then we hunger for it even more, you know, it's for the already, but not yet. yeah. It's tantalizing.

00:55:33:11 - 00:55:58:26

Victoria Loorz

And you do rearrange your life around a contemplative practice, you know. And you do. And you. So you find yourself rearranging your life around, being in relationship with the natural world and longing for more intimacy, you know, and longing for more opportunities to connect. And,

00:55:58:28 - 00:56:01:22

Victoria Loorz

You know, and periods.

00:56:01:24 - 00:56:36:02

Kelly Deutsch

Yes. I feel like I could ask probably like, 18 more questions, but I should probably wrap it up. this has been really lovely, and I feel like such a beautiful invitation into, not only into the natural world, but recognizing our place in it that we are already there, a part of it. And if if people are hungry to learn more about what you do, what you guys are up to, you know, in the Wild Church network, or check out your book, where should they go?

00:56:36:04 - 00:56:58:27

Victoria Loorz

Yeah, probably all the links are on my website, which is just Victoria luers.com l o r z. and there's links to the World Church network and then the the Seminary of the wild and and my book, there's links in there or you can look it up online. Sold. So where books are sold. Yeah. Wonderful. Thank you.

00:56:58:28 - 00:57:04:23

Kelly Deutsch

Yeah. I so appreciate you joining us today and taking time to share a bit of bit of your journey and the work that you've been doing.

00:57:04:23 - 00:57:11:02

Victoria Loorz

And it was fun to feel the resonance and, to go down this little path together.

00:57:11:04 - 00:57:13:11

Kelly Deutsch

Yes, absolutely. Well, thank you so much.