An illustrated companion to Beyond Stewardship, edited by David Paul Warners and Matthew Kuperus Heun

Beyond Stewardship is intended to equip Christians to live better in this world by helping us all think more intentionally about the relationship we have with the nonhuman creation in which we are necessarily and thoroughly embedded. It responds to the questions “What if God didn’t place humans on earth to be stewards of creation but something else?” and “If not stewards, then what?”

The chapters in Beyond Stewardship were written by scholars from diverse disciplines who share a deep passion for a flourishing creation. Each chapter begins with a compelling story that draws the reader into new ways of thinking. Each author then looks beyond stewardship from the context of his or her own discipline and experiences. Some reimagine creation care by expanding on the traditional notion of stewardship. Others set aside the stewardship model and offer alternative ways to understand our presence within the broader creation. The chapters mark out ways to better live in the places we inhabit as individuals, communities, and institutions.

Collectively, the essays in Beyond Stewardship offer an expanded and enlivened understanding of the place of humans in the context of God’s creation.

Table of Contents

Click the following links to visit the individual chapter webpages:

Part 1: Rethinking: Expanding Awareness

Part 2: Reimagining: How Things Could Be

Part 3: Reorienting: Hopeful Ways Forward

Postlude

Author Bios

Mark D. Bjelland’s first career as an environmental engineer exposed him to scores of forlorn, polluted, and poverty-stricken places. His engineering training prepared him for the technical problems he encountered but not the social and ethical questions they raised. He returned to graduate school, studying environmental ethics and theology with Loren Wilkinson at Regent College and earning a Ph.D. in urban geography from the University of Minnesota. His research explores the interface of urbanization, justice, and the environment. He taught geography and environmental studies at Gustavus Adolphus College for fifteen years prior to coming to Calvin College in 2013. He is co-author of Human Geography: Landscape of Human Activities and has published articles in The Geographical Review, Urban Geography, The Professional Geographer, and the Research Journal of the Water Pollution Control Federation.

For supplemental materials and images for Bjelland's chapter, click the following link:

Dietrich Bouma is a doctoral student in city and regional planning at Cornell University, where he studies land security, environmental governance, and conservation and development in developing countries. He has a B.S. in biology from Calvin College and a M.S./M.P.P. in environmental policy from the University of Michigan. He has worked with the Huron River Watershed Council, United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Au Sable Institute of Environmental Studies, World Resources Institute, and the University of Michigan Graham Sustainability Institute.

For supplemental materials and images for Bouma's chapter, click the following link:

Steven Bouma-Prediger is the Leonard and Marjorie Maas Professor of Reformed Theology at Hope College in Holland, Michigan. A graduate of Hope College, his Ph.D. is in religious studies from The University of Chicago. He has won numerous teaching awards, including being selected by the Hope class of 1999 as the recipient of the Hope Outstanding Professor- Educator Award. His most recent book is Earthkeeping and Character: Exploring a Christian Ecological Virtue Ethic. Other books include For the Beauty of the Earth: A Christian Vision for Creation Care, revised second edition, and Beyond Homelessness: Christian Faith in a Culture of Displacement, co-authored with Brian Walsh.

For supplemental materials and images for Bouma-Prediger's chapter, click the following link:

Aminah Al-Attas Bradford, doctoral candidate at Duke University's Divinity School, writes at the intersection of Christian theology and ecology. She is a fellow at the Forum for Theological Exploration and ordained in the Christian Reformed Church in North America (CRCNA). She is the author of a recent article entitled “Living in the Company of Beasts: Karl Barth, the Microbiome, and the Unwitting Microbial Witness of the Divine Bearing of All Things.”

For supplemental materials and images for Al-Attas Bradford's chapter, click the following link:

Gabrielle Eisma is a first-year student at Calvin College, with a major in writing and studio art and a concentration in illustration. She plans to work as an illustrator for young adult and children’s literature.

To see the children's book motioned in the Postlude, click the following link:

Kathi Groenendyk is professor of strategic communication at Calvin College, teaching classes in persuasion, visual rhetoric, and communication and conflict resolution. She earned her doctorate from the Pennsylvania State University and her master’s degree at Texas A&M University. Her research has focused on environmental communication and has included the study of William Jennings Bryan’s ‘The Menace of Darwinism’.”

For supplemental materials and images for Groenendyk's chapter, click the following link:

Matthew C. Halteman is professor of philosophy at Calvin College and fellow in the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, UK. He teaches and writes on twentieth-century European philosophy (especially hermeneutics and philosophy as a way of life) and applied ethics (especially food and animal ethics) and is the author of Compassionate Eating as Care of Creation and co-editor (with Andrew Chignell and Terence Cuneo) of Philosophy Comes to Dinner: Arguments about the Ethics of Eating.

Megan Halteman Zwart is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Saint Mary’s College (Notre Dame, IN). Megan received her bachelor’s degree from Calvin College (Grand Rapids, MI) and her PhD from the University of Notre Dame. She teaches classes in the history of philosophy and applied ethics, including food ethics and medical ethics. Megan has published articles in the areas of engaged pedagogy, the ethics of eating, and philosophy as a way of life. Her current research examines how to reduce polarization in classroom environments, enabling students to engage in dialogue across difference.

For supplemental materials and images for Halteman and Halteman Zwart's chapter, click the following link:

Becky Roselius Haney is associate professor of economics at Calvin College and earned her PhD in economics from the University of Chicago. Her research interests include the economics of sustainability, resource depletion, and energy transitions. She works on the forefront of economic research methodology by applying agent-based computer simulation models to these macroeconomic phenomena. She also has a Master's of Divinity from Duke University and is interested in the interaction of faith and sustainable economic activity. Becky is an author of Beyond GDP: National Accounting in the Age of Resource Depletion.

For supplemental materials and images for Haney's chapter, click the following link:

Gail Gunst Heffner is a member of the faculty at Calvin College, currently serving as the director of community engagement in the Office of the Provost. Her PhD is in Urban Studies and Resource Development from Michigan State University. Gail is one of the founders of Plaster Creek Stewards and is serving as the principal administrator for several large grants designated for watershed restoration in the Plaster Creek watershed. She is an editor of Commitment and Connection: Service-Learning and Christian Higher Education. Gail has also published several articles on community-based research, engaged scholarship, social capital, community development, environmental service-learning, and reconciliation ecology.

For supplemental materials and images for Heffner's chapter, click the following link:

Matthew Kuperus Heun is professor of engineering at Calvin College. He earned an MS and PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and later worked at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and at Global Aerospace Corporation. He has been a visiting scholar at the Centre for Renewable and Sustainable Energy Studies at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa. His long-term research question is “What is the relationship between energy and the economy when viewed through the lens of sustainability?” In addition to scores of articles, he is lead author of Beyond GDP: National Accounting in the Age of Resource Depletion.

For supplemental materials and images for Heun's chapter, click the following link:

Clarence W. Joldersma is professor of education at Calvin College where he teaches philosophy of education. He has a broad A Levinasian Ethics for Education’s Commonplaces: Between Calling and Inspiration and Neuroscience and Education: A Philosophical Appraisal. He has co-edited, with Sean Blenkinsop a themed issue of Educational Theory on environment and philosophy and published essays on environmental ethics.

For supplemental materials and images for Joldersma's chapter, click the following link:

Leah Knoor is a first-year student at Calvin College, with majors in Biol- ogy and Biochemistry. She plans to pursue a career in microbiological research after graduation.

To see the children's book motioned in the Postlude, click the following link:

Kyle Meyaard-Schaap serves as the National Organizer and Spokesperson for Young Evangelicals for Climate Action, a national network of young Christians taking action to address the climate crisis as an expression of their Christian witness and discipleship. Kyle holds an undergraduate degree in religious studies from Calvin College, a Master of Divinity degree from Western Theological Seminary, and is ordained in the Christian Reformed Church in North America (CRCNA). His work on climate change education and advocacy has been featured in national and international news outlets such as PBS, NPR, NBC News, Reuters, and US News and World Report. Recent articles from Kyle include “Stopping Climate Change is a Part of Following Jesus” and “Renewing Evangelical Engagement on Climate Change: The Birth and Growth of ‘Young Evangelicals For Climate Action’.”

For supplemental materials and images for Meyaard-Schaap's chapter, click the following link:

Debra Rienstra is professor of English at Calvin College, where she teaches early modern British literature and creative writing. She earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan and her PhD in English literature from Rutgers. She is the author of three books of nonfiction as well as many essays, writing regularly for The Reformed Journal’s blog, “The Twelve,” on topics including spirituality, worship, arts and literature, higher education, and pop culture. Her current writing projects focus on spirituality and place, particularly in connection with the dunes ecosystems of the West Michigan shoreline.

For supplemental materials and images for Rienstra's chapter, click the following link:

Hannah Riffell is a first-year student at Calvin College, with a major in English Writing. She plans to pursue a career in writing after graduation.

To see the children's book motioned in the Postlude, click the following link:

James R. Skillen is associate professor of environmental studies at Calvin College. He writes about both federal lands in the American West and the relationship between Christian faith and creation care. His favorite class to teach, a May field course in Yosemite National Park, combines both interests. A recent article and forthcoming book are titled “Federal Ecosystem Management: Its Rise, Fall, and Afterlife” and This Land is My Land: Rebellion, Authority, and Federal Lands.

For supplemental materials and images for Skillen's chapter, click the following link:

David Paul Warners is professor of biology at Calvin College, teaching classes in botany, biological research, evolution, and restoration ecology. He received an MS from the University of Wisconsin and a PhD from the University of Michigan. With colleague Gail Gunst Heffner, he initiated a campus-based group called Plaster Creek Stewards that works with the broader community to restore health and beauty to the local watershed. His recent articles include “Assessing a reconciliation ecology approach to suburban landscaping: Biodiversity on a college campus” and “Reconciliation ecology: A new paradigm for advancing creation care.”

For supplemental materials and images for Warners' chapter, click the following link: