I actually found my copy of Sally McFague's book, Super, Natural Christians: How We Should Love Nature on a shelf and pulled it out to rummage through it. It was written 20+ years ago and I probably purchased it shortly after publication. Eco-feminist theologian McFague was an American teaching at the Vancouver School of Theology, of which the United Church was a part. McFague had hiked in BC years before and was struck by the tourism motto, Super, Natural, British Columbia. She felt that this is the way the word supernatural should be written.
As I flipped through the pages I found little tags and plenty of highlighted phrases and passages. McFague was convinced beyond question that we should love nature because the Christian God is embodied:
That is what the incarnation claims, God does not despise physical reality but loves it and has become one with it. The Christian tradition is full of body language: the Word made flesh, the bread and the wine that become the body and blood of Christ, the body of the Church.
While this theological perspective has become more prevalent in recent years I found the book enlightening and affirming as a Christian pastor sorting through my love for the natural world. It simply rang true, even though I didn't agree with everything McFague wrote, or at least I didn't at the time.
I was saddened to see on the weekend that McFague had died at the age of 85, and intrigued that Vancouver remained her home until the end. Thank you, Sallie McFague, for your super, natural witness.
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