The Holy Wild with Victoria Loorz

In this conversation, Debra Rienstra, PhD, author of Refugia Faith and professor of English at Calvin University, joins Victoria Loorz to explore refugia, a biological term for small pockets of life that survive widespread environmental stress and become sources of regeneration after collapse. Debra invites us to imagine these protected pockets are also in our communities as forms of sanctuary amid increasingly uninhabitable social, spiritual, and ecological conditions. Together, they reflect on how small gatherings rooted in love for the land can counter paralysis in the face of global crisis and rewild our sense of vocation and voice. They explore the spiritual risk of loving places we may not own or keep, while naming how restoration begins through intimate, connected acts of care that allow life to persist and return.Connect with Debra:Website: debrarienstra.comBook: Refugia Faith: Seeking Hidden Shelters, Ordinary Wonders, and the Healing of the EarthNewsletter: refugianewsletter.substack.comUpcoming Book: Refugia Church (January 2027)Mentioned in the episode:Book: Great Tide Rising: Towards Clarity and Moral Courage in a time of Planetary Change by Kathleen Dean MooreOrganization: blackchurchfoodsecurity.netBook: Here Comes the Sun: A Last Chance for the Climate and a Fresh Chance for Civilization by Bill McKibbenEncyclical Letter Laudato Si' of the Holy Father Francis on Care For Our Common HomeEncyclical Letter Fratelli Tutti of the Holy Father Francis on Fraternity and Social FriendshipConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: [email protected]: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 — Introduction03:48 — Refugia08:58 — Finding My Small Work11:44 — Deciding the Work Based on Context14:33 — Examples of Human Refugia20:21 — From Passivity to Citizenship24:21 — Loving Places That Are Only Yours for a Time29:36 — Choosing to Belong31:59 — Grieving Reality Together34:18 — Mitigation and Adaptation40:02 — A Kalo Farmer in Relationship With the Land43:04 — The Book of Nature & Pantheism Paranoia46:30 — The Wild Edge50:03 — Wild Invitation53:24 — Credits

In this conversation, author of Earth and Soul: Reconnecting Amid Climate Chaos, speaker, retreat leader and longtime spiritual formation guide Leah Rampy joins Victoria Loorz to explore spirituality as a lived relationship to the natural world—where trees are kin, not symbols, and reciprocity replaces extraction. Leah reflects on her journey from corporate life into a decolonizing spirituality & leadership rooted in ecological belonging, sharing stories of black walnut trees, Wild Church as a practice of community and communion, and the slow unlayering of protective armor. Together, they reflect on how awe and grief must be held together, how the deepest forms of communion exceed language, and how remembering ourselves as part of a living, interwoven world can restore wholeness in a time of collective unraveling.Connect with Leah:Website: leahmoranrampy.comBook: Earth and SoulBook: Discovering the Spiritual Wisdom of TreesMentioned in the episode:Shalem InstituteConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: [email protected]: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 — Introduction02:57 — Interview begins04:36 — Leah’s background07:30 — A calling to educate11:38 — The power of storytelling13:20 — The black walnut tree17:05 — Decolonizing the soul20:33 — Communication in community23:26 — Seeking to know how we cause harm27:05 — Bearing witness28:39 — Church of the Wild: Two Rivers33:59 — Love beyond words35:08 — Communion37:26 — Trees as ancient teachers of life41:34 — Giving and receiving46:33 — A wandering invitation48:38 — Credits

In this conversation, Certified Soul Level Animal Communicators and grief-intuitive coaches from The Animal Communication Collective (ACC)—Julie Hirt, Karen Dendy Smith, and Meredith Tollison—offer a vivid picture of animal communication as a soul-to-soul exchange that restores trust, deepens wholeness, and opens doorways to healing and transformation. They demystify why losing an animal often breaks us open more than losing a human, explore how animals help surface grief we have long buried, and share stories from clients who continue receiving guidance through images, humor, sensations, and inner knowing even after their animals have crossed the veil. The trio also reflect on how each of them slowly found their way back to the sacred after religious trauma, supported by magnolia trees, ocean wind, and the quiet companionship of the animals who stayed close to them. You can hear more from Julie, Karen, and Meredith on their own podcast, The Animal Communication podcast. Connect with The Animal Communicators:Website: animalcommunicationcollective.comPodcast: theanimalcommunicationpodcast.comJulie: juliehirt-intuitive.comKaren: karendendysmith.comMeredith: meredithtollison.comMentioned in the episode:Book: All Creatures Great and Small by James HerriotBook: Opal- The Journal of an Understanding Heart by Opal WhiteleyFigure: Anna Breytenbach @ animalspirit.orgConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: [email protected]: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 — Introduction05:32 — Interview begins06:23 — Introducing Julie06:51 — Introducing Karen07:45 — Introducing Meredith08:28 — Unconditional love & authenticity13:33 — Julie’s grief origins16:02 — Karen’s grief origins17:41 — Meredith’s grief origins19:21 — Grief unlocked by companion animals22:34 — The felt sense of animals in spirit26:27 — The claires / intuitive senses30:48 — Accessing the sacred31:38 — Julie’s spiritual upbringing34:29 — Karen’s spiritual upbringing36:13 — Meredith’s spiritual upbringing38:21 — Reconnecting words41:34 — Why grief feels different with animals43:37 — Loss rituals44:44 — The “placeness” of animals54:38 — The animal communication collective56:43 — Wild invitation58:09 — Credits

In this conversation with Victoria Loorz, Randy Woodley shares stories from his Cherokee lineage, his mother’s deep communion with plants and animals, and his decades of land based ministry at Eloheh Farm. Together they explore why many today stand on the "inside and outside edges" of the Christian story, the collapse of institutional religion, and how Creator often works through seasons of chaos. Woodley describes this era as a time of composting, where old systems break down so more relational and grounded ways of being can emerge. He invites listeners to let go of rigid categories and doctrines and return to what he calls our original human vocation: co-sustaining the community of creation through simple acts of love, reciprocity, and right relationship, where meals become communion, tending becomes prayer, and all beings are kin.Rev. Dr. Randy Woodley, Ph.D., is a farmer, activist scholar, speaker, teacher, and Indigenous wisdom keeper whose work spans spirituality, justice, culture, racial diversity, regenerative farming, and our relationship with the Earth. Connect with Randy: Book: Becoming Rooted: One Hundred Days of Reconnecting with Sacred EarthBook: How Western Christian Got It Wrong (Forthcoming)Substack: @rwoodley7Personal Website: randywoodley.comEloheh Website: eloheh.orgMentioned in the episode:Documentary: The Year The Earth ChangedConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: [email protected]: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:00:00 – Introduction06:35 – Interview Starts08:14 – The Land Who Raised Randy10:08 – Academy Experience11:53 – Eloheh12:50 – Bridging Across the Edges15:09 – Widespread Abandonment of Institutionalized Western Religion19:05 – Replacing the Programs with Relationship23:56 – Co-Sustainers27:06 – Finding New Language31:15 – Becoming Rooted35:33 – Repairing the Separations37:57 – Seeds Are Our Treasure39:29 – The War on Indigenous Lands41:58 – Create Human Rights for the Earth43:40 – Sacred Clowns46:14 – Sacred Invitation

Biologist, biosemiotician, philosopher, and author of Matter and Desire: An Erotic Ecology, Andreas Weber, PhD, joins Victoria Loorz for a heartfelt conversation about reality as a sacred, living process of relationship - the continual desire to give life and what the heart knows as love. Together they explore how trauma causes us to forget our wholeness and how true healing is an act of remembering. Drawing on Sufi mysticism and the writings of Erich Fromm, Weber describes love as “the interest in the aliveness of the other” and names this time of global unraveling as a painful yet essential gift calling us to live in truth. Through stories of rivers, trees, & animals, he reveals how the more-than-human world restores trust, belonging, and courage. Blending science, mysticism, and deep ecology, you're invited you to sit with the living world, listen with an open heart, and remember that you are love, embodied and alive.Dr Andreas Weber is a biologist, philosopher, and poet and teaches ecophilosophy and ecological aesthetics at the Berlin University of the Arts. He holds degrees in marine biology and cultural studies, earned his PhD in philosophy in with a dissertation titled in English “Nature as Meaning: An Attempt at a Semiotic Theory of the Living” .Connect with Andreas: Book: Matter and Desire: An Erotic Ecology by Andreas WeberConnect with the Center:Website: wildspirituality.earthVictoria's Website: victorialoorz.comEmail: [email protected]: linktr.ee/ctrforwildspiritualityInstagram: @center_for_wild_spiritualityTimestamps:0:00 — Introduction5:54 — Interview7:03 — Living Through Trauma and Pain10:38 — We Exist Only as Love13:32 — Dissolving at the Shore18:20 — Meeting Victoria’s More-Than-Human Neighbors19:58 — Defining the Sacred22:39 — Love Is the Interest in the Aliveness of the Other24:10 — Two Sides of Gifts27:37 — Our Era of Dying May Be a Gift31:37 — Religios Is Remembering It Has Always Been One35:43 — Resistance as Simply Truth39:27 — Truths About You and Your Heart47:56 — Wandering Invitation