PUBLICATIONS
Since the Center’s beginnings in 2000, educators, naturalists, therapists, parents and others gathered in listening circles to consider how we might recover the inner vision of a society in harmony with nature and explore in co-presence our unique roles and voices in creating a reciprocity of care between human beings and the natural world.
From the beginning, the Center documented and published its work so that all that we experienced, understood and practiced would not be limited to ourselves, but could become communicable to others and transmitted to future generations.
From 2004-2024, the Center published a biannual journal, Chrysalis, where our emerging work was articulated over the course of 20 years, available in digital form in the Chrysalis Archives, 2004-2024.
In 2011, we published Only the Sacred: Transforming Education in the Twenty-first Century, edited by Peggy Whalen-Levitt–a collection of significant essays by educator/participants in our programs, including Thomas Berry’s essay, “Our Children: Their Future.”
In 2012, Carolyn Toben published Recovering a Sense of the Sacred: Conversations with Thomas Berry–conversations that were foundational to the formation of the Center’s work.
In 2014, we created a performance piece, The Meadow Across the Creek: Words From Thomas Berry, for the Thomas Berry Centennial at the Greensboro Historical Museum, scripted in Chrysalis (Fall 2023), 4-27.
Publications expanded in 2015 with our Emergence Series authored by those close to the Center who were carrying the work forward in new and promising ways: Opening Forgotten Sanctuaries: Recognizing Education as Sacred Encounter by Clay Lerner; All the Scattered Leaves of the Universe: Journey and Vision in Dante’s Divine Comedy and the Work of Thomas Berry by Andrew Levitt; and I am You, You are Me: The Interrelatedness of Self, Spirituality and the Natural World in Childhood by Colette Segalla.
In 2017, we published Heron Mornings, a collection of poetry by Andrew Levitt.
Finally, in 2023 we published the synthesis and culmination of our work in The Place of Our Belonging: A Work for Children and Educators Mentored by Thomas Berry, edited by Peggy Whalen-Levitt.
Center Books
The Place of Our Belonging: A Work for Children and Educators Mentored by Thomas Berry
Edited and Introduced by Peggy Whalen-Levitt
Greensboro, NC: CEINW, 2023
Only the Sacred: Transforming Education in the Twenty-first Century
Edited by Peggy Whalen-Levitt
Greensboro, NC: CEINW, 2011
All the Scattered Leaves of the Universe: Journey and Vision in Dante’s Divine Comedy and the Work of Thomas Berry
by Andrew Levitt
Greensboro, NC: CEINW, 2015
I Am You, You Are Me: The Interrelatedness of Self, Spirituality, and the Natural World in Childhood
by Colette Segalla
Greensboro, NC: CEINW, 2015
Opening Forgotten Sanctuaries: Recognizing Education as Sacred Encounter
by Clay Lerner
Greensboro, NC: CEINW, 2015
Chrysalis
The first issue of Chrysalis, the journal of the Center for Education, Imagination and the Natural World, was published in the Spring of 2004. All issues of Chrysalis are available for download in the Chrysalis Archive here.
Collections of Practices
The Center’s 2-year co-research program, The Inner Life of the Child in Nature: Presence and Practice, culminates with the publication of a Collection of Practices created by the participants during the second year of the program. These collections are archived and available for free download here.
Selected Readings
The work of the Center has been deeply informed by the thoughts of those in depth psychology, phenomenology, spiritual ecology, contemplative traditions, holistic science and many others seeking to breathe life into the world. A list of selected readings that have informed our work can be downloaded here.