Ritual Responses to Environmental Guilt and Shame

Abstract

Having articulated the conditions to respond to or induce environmental guilt and shame, it is reasonable to wonder how humans could develop such resources. Chapter 9 maintains that religious rituals have the ability to create and sustain the conditions. This argument is founded on two strands of thought: J. Z. Smith and Catherine Bell’s theories of ritual, particularly regarding rites of affliction, which respond to disorder or wrong and provide terminology for conceiving of ritual in general. Studies of environmental ritual, especially the work of William R. Jordan III, Gretel van Wieren, and Joanna Macy who identify ritual as a way of responding to negative experiences, affects, and states of being, enable the consideration of environmental rituals. Their work requires expansion to deal relationships between humans or involving collectives, particularly the need to apologize to those harmed and change behavior to prevent further harm. Spontaneous confessional rituals about environmental guilt and shame in popular online confessions and an apology ritual at the Standing Rock prayer camp against the Dakota Access Pipeline exhibit some of these features but are still limited with respect to the conditions required to respond to guilt and shame. Thus, intentional ritualization and using multiple rituals will likely be necessary to respond to all of the dimensions of guilt and shame.