Join us with: Dr Lyla June Johnston, longtime Indigenous activist, a veteran of the Standing Rock protests, incredible poet, musician, and scholar. Angharad Wynne, lifelong devotee of the landscapes and lore of the British Isles, writer, and teacher. Justine Huxley, ex CEO of St Ethelburga’s, co-founder of Kincentric Leadership, and Sufi, will facilitate this event with Mishal Baig of St Ethelburga’s Centre.
How can we restore a sense of being kin with all of life? What can we learn from the extraordinary courage shown by indigenous communities around the world, many of whom are on the frontlines of the climate crisis? How can we reach across wisdom traditions to learn how to deepen a felt sense of intimacy with the more-than-human world? How might climate responsiveness look different if, collectively, we were more able to conceive of pro-environmental, adaptive solutions, from this place of intimacy? What does it mean to confront polycrisis through the lens of kinship, and how does this look different across continents and traditions? Do tensions arise between these perspectives and how can we navigate these? How can we best protect indigenous communities? What can those of all faiths and none learn from this enquiry?
This event is a part of our Faith and Moral Courage series. At each event, we invite spiritual and faith leaders from diverse backgrounds to explore what it means to respond with faith and courage to the daunting challenges of our times. Past speakers have included Adam Bucko, Jetsumna Tenzin Palmo, Sr Lucy Kurien, Bayo Akomalafe, Toko-pa Turner, Daniel Maté, Paula Boddington and more.
Dr. Lyla June Johnston and Angharad Wynne will share share how their respective Indigenous traditions guide them to cultivate kinship with all life. The evening will juxtapose Native American (Dine’ Nation) and Welsh Indigenous traditions in an exchange with one another. These two strains of indigeneity, evolved on different continents, reaching far back in our history, will meet across cultures and time.
80% of Earth’s biodiversity flourishes in landscapes looked after by indigenous peoples. As Lyla June Johnston often says, human beings, when they are in alignment with the Earth, are a keystone species in Earth’s ecologies. How we can support these keystone indigenous communities will be another important point of reflection during our gathering. We will also touch upon how those of us not rooted in an indigenous tradition may nonetheless recover and reconnect with our belonging to the Earth. And song and storytelling will form a part of this conversation.
All of Lyla’s proceeds from this event will go to cultural revitalisation centres in the US.
Lyla June Johnston
Dr. Lyla June Johnston (aka Lyla June) is an Indigenous musician, scholar, and community organizer of Diné (Navajo), Tsétsêhéstâhese (Cheyenne) and European lineages. Her messages focus on Indigenous rights, supporting youth, traditional land stewardship practices and healing inter-generational and inter-cultural trauma. She blends her study of Human Ecology at Stanford, graduate work in Indigenous Pedagogy, and the traditional worldview she grew up with to inform her music, perspectives and solutions. Her doctoral research focused on the ways in which pre-colonial Indigenous Nations shaped large regions of Turtle Island (aka the Americas) to produce abundant food systems for humans and non-humans.
Angharad Wynne
Angharad has spent much of her life exploring the landscapes and lore of this land. Since childhood, she has followed her feet along pathways back through the portals of ancient myth, folklore, history, song and poetry of Britain, and particularly of her native Wales.
Today, she draws together the fragments of our tradition, that can help guide and sustain a living spiritual practice, connected to this land and her creatures. She shares her learning and explores understanding and contemporary practice through retreats, storytelling gatherings, ceremony, dreaming circles, writings and pilgrimages. These are conceived as radical acts of re-membering our soulful, deep humanity and re-weaving ourselves back into fully engaged participation within the web of life. Angharad is a published poet and writer, a storyteller, speaker, teacher and expedition leader. She is the founder of Dreaming the Land and Animate Earth Collective and leads Dadeni, a three year programme exploring the native spiritual traditions and practices of the British Isles.
This event forms part of a longer event series exploring what faith and moral courage look like in an age of polycrisis. Where does extraordinary courage come from? What can we learn from people who’ve risked everything to live up to their values? What forms of courage are especially needed in our age of unravelling, uncertainty and risk? How can we inspire ourselves and each other to grow our capacity to brave our limits? Are there insights from the world’s spiritual and faith traditions that can help us grow our courage?
Justine Huxley
As Co-Founder of Kincentric Leadership, Justine‘s core passion is working with others to awaken humanity to a deeper understanding of our kinship with all life. Justine was previously CEO of St Ethelburga’s Centre, where she worked for 18 years, innovating programmes on spiritual ecology, radical resilience and communion with the wild. She set up Kincentric Leadership 6 months ago with Anna Kovasna from the Global Ecovillage Network. She has a PhD in psychology and belongs to a Sufi tradition, leading meditation and dreamwork groups for over 20 years. She is also the author of “Generation Y, Spirituality & Social Change”.
This event is a collaboration with Kincentric Leadership.
This event is supported by The Fetzer Institute.
