Bod Pod
post #2
In his book, Fragments of the Spirit,¹ Wallace presents a theology that exposes the arrogant stance of humans toward the rest of Creation. We consume with little to no regard for what it costs another being. This is one of the primary sources of pain, disconnection, and trauma in the world. The earth does not have a voice to speak out against this injustice, but expresses it in other ways, such as natural disasters and degraded ecosystems. Wallace argues that Creation deserves our respect due to the fact that the Spirit is present in all of Creation. Thus, our irreverent and selfish consumption of resources is truly living in defiance of the mutuality that God intended for our world.
The ideas of Wallace mirror the ideas of Rogers in her book, The Unsayable.² Rogers embarks on studying the effects of trauma and how it separates the victim from their connection to their body as well as their ability to put language to their experience. In particular, Rogers interviews young girls (often the victims of sexual abuse) and observes the ways in which they link their trauma to their language through signifiers, which are repetitions of sounds or words, that are reminiscent of their abuse. For example, victims often use words that rhyme with the name of the abuser without conscious awareness. Also, the same person may use words, seemingly innocuous, that described the scene of abuse repetitiously to describe many other experiences that initially appear to be unrelated. This signifies the pervasiveness of abuse in the very vocabulary of the victim without their awareness. Also, Rogers examines behaviors that reenact abuse when the victim is not even aware that their body is perpetuating the experience, such as when children unconsciously draw similar pictures or act out scenes with stuffed animals.
The observations of Rogers and the ideas of Wallace intersect with the idea that abusers take a stance of exploitation through the exertion of power in order to fulfill their own desires, much like humans exploit the earth. Abusers act with no regard for the well-being of their victims. As a result of the abuse, victims lose their connection to their bodies and their use of language in the same way that the earth does not have an explicit method of communication. Therefore, trauma manifests itself through various nonverbal behaviors or repetitions in word choice when language is used, or, in the case of the earth, the devastating effects of changes to migration patterns and food chains.
Both Wallace and Rogers claim that healing is possible through reconnection. For Wallace, reconnection is accomplished through the work of the Holy Spirit, which restores our relationship to the earth. In many ways, our dependence on the earth is similar to our dependence on our bodies. The earth protects us in much the same way that our bodies attempt to protect us from our environment. We need re-establish our connection with the earth in order to bring about the healthy vision for Creation that God originally intended in a similar fashion to how we need to get back in touch with our bodies to engage our trauma.
