SEMINARY of the WILD EARTH
online & onland eco-spirituality certificates
Restoring Kindred Relationship with the Sacred Earth
Our culture is in the midst of a spiritual crisis. The old stories of hierarchy and separation are giving way to a new story of interconnection and belonging. As our species learns to navigate this emerging paradigm, the guidance that we need can only be found by reconnecting with the wisdom of the land and listening to the voice of Mystery in all things.
Seminary of the Wild Earth is an experiential certificate program for those who seek to restore kindred relationship with the sacred earth. Participants are invited to wander on the land, to enter into conversation with the wild others, and to engage in practices of rewilding the soul. This program is a container for deep dialogue with a cohort of like-hearted friends.
a threshold crossing
The Emerging New Story
Needs a New Kind of Spiritual Leader
The well-worn path—the way others have gone—leads you to a place where you are uniquely invited to step off the trail. This is an invitation to depart from what is familiar and easy in order to step into what is wild and unknown.—Church of the Wild
There is not much hope to be found in the old story. The story that has dominated much of the world for thousands of years — hierarchy, control, and separation of matter and spirit — has led us to a pivotal moment in time where we face challenges unparalleled in human history. We have been raised within this dying story, but our hearts know of a more beautiful world. That is where deep hope lies — that our hearts can open and speak to the living world and unseen realms around and within us.
This is a kairos moment — an opportune and deep moment in time where we turn and face the unknowing that. marks this time in-between stories, toward a paradigm that affirms the interconnected sacredness of all things. Only this deep transformation can fundamentally change our self, our communities, and the world.
The core of our ecological and cultural challenges is a spiritual problem that organized religion or politics is not going to solve. A new kind of spiritual leader is needed. Those called to co-create this new way are first called into the wilderness, like most of our spiritual ancestors.
Seminary of the Wild Earth is for those who sense that they are holding the seeds for a new story in our world, in our religions, and in our cultures. The program is a safe container for exploring, questioning, wondering and remembering how to listen to the sacred whispers heard in and between all things. This one or two year program is a new kind of seminary that invites you to honor and nurture the seed of vision growing louder inside you, urging you into service to the New Story of the kin-dom of God — the realized vision of restored sacred interconnection of all things in beloved community.
Program Format:
Eco-Spirituality Certificate
Seminary of the Wild Earth begins with a foundational yearlong program aimed at deepening into your own eco-spirituality and connecting more deeply with the Place you inhabit. Online sessions bring participants through a process of inner transformation, shaped by invitations to saunter on the land, practices of reconnecting with the wild soul, provocative teachings from Victoria and wild luminaries, and intimate council sessions with a small group of fellow wanderers.
This is a standalone program, with each graduate receiving an Eco-Spirituality Certificate. It also serves as a foundation for the vocational certificates.
Optional: Vision Quest
Nearly every culture has enacted some form of the Vision Quest as a rite of passage for those entering a new phase in their life. It is a deep immersion into the rhythms of the wild earth, a re-orientation of your own place in it, and a clarifying of our roles as spiritual leaders. Graduates of the Eco-Spirituality Certificate program are invited to embark on a guided vision quest as a way to honor this transition within themselves and to reaffirm their commitment to the wild earth.
Elective Vocational Certificates
For those graduates who wish the continue the journey, Seminary of the Wild Earth evolves into a second year of stepping into your wild call. "Vocation" is more than just a job, it's your way of putting your spiritual call into action. Vocation is about living into the wholeness of your wild self in service to a world in need of your particular gifts.
Participants choose one of the following certificate tracks:
EcoSpiritual Direction
Certification
Eco-spiritual direction is a form of spiritual companionship in reverent conversation with the living world. The first and only program of its kind, this track is rooted and shaped by deep ecology and the wisdom of the wild. This is a fully certified spiritual direction training, offered in partnership with Stillpoint, which has been training spiritual directors for over forty years. Open to both existing spiritual directors and those seeking to become one.
Wild Guide
Certification
Step fully into your wild call as a new kind of spiritual leader. No matter what your vocation or area of expertise, your life experiences and gifts can be offered in service to wild mystery. This track will equip you to tap into the emerging perspective of interconnection and wildness and to apply this paradigm to your work and sense of leadership. The world doesn’t need another guru, but we do need elders - of all generations. This certificate is an initiation into your wild call.
OnLand: Wild Ordination Ceremony
Seminary of the Wild Earth concludes with an optional in-person ceremony at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico. Graduates will gather to mark the transition to the next phase of their lives though a ceremony of Wild Ordination. Unlike in the traditional sense where spiritual leaders are ordained in service to a religious order, this is an ordination into service of the wild earth. Surrounded by red-rock mesas and cottonwood trees, this ceremony is an initiation and a celebration of the journey we have been through together.
Our Approach
Delve into your own connection with wild mystery through the three aspects of eco-spirituality: a more intimate relationship with an alive and sacred earth, self-integration and wholeness, and rewilding your spirituality no matter what tradition.
This path involves experiential ways of learning, using all your senses, emotions, and body, as well as your mind. The teaching comes in the form of wandering on the land, embodiment exercises, deep personal investigation, creative expression, and much more. Throughout this course, you will learn not only how to go deep to discover your own particular calling and gifts, but if you choose, how to deliver those gifts in service to the world.
1. Wild Earth. Restoring intimacy with your place because your place is holy. You open the gates to this enchanted land and you step through the threshold. You are drawn by mystery and learn to listen to the messages that are spoken in a language beyond words.
2. Wild Soul. Tapping into your wild self begins by asking yourself deep questions. Where do you feel tamed? In which ways are you ready to step outside the culture of domestication? Rewilding your soul means remembering that you are part of the fabric of nature, and you are called to be her hands and her voice.
3. Wild Spirit. Listening to the land inevitably brings about insights which are spiritual but not religious. You are called to rewild your spirituality in deep relationship with the more-than-human others. All these voices are holy. We all are living on sacred ground.
Wild Earth
Wild Spirit
Wild Soul
These three aspects are interconnected, and while each module focuses in on one of them, the program as a whole lies in the center, where all these aspects come together. By bringing the wild earth and her wild spirit into relationship with your wild soul, you can discover your wild calling.
Program Elements
Live online sessions
The full cohort meets bi-weekly for live zoom sessions we call “seedings,” meant to sprout new ways of connecting with an alive and sacred planet. Victoria, along with a team of "wild luminaries," orient the sessions with content to shift your relationship with your place, with Mystery, and your own soul. The experiential sessions are rich with deepening invitations, embodiment practices, and immersive imaginal journeys, all rooted in wandering experiences in your own wild places.
Guided small group councils
Every other week, participants meet in council with an intimate group of 6-8 others. These are “kinship groups” that deepen throughout the year, led by Wild Guides who are gifted eco-therapists, eco-spiritual directors, and wild coaches who have deeply engaged in this work themselves. Council is a safe space to share from the heart to integrate the transformative experiences, and hold one another in mutual support.
Seasonal intensives
Each of the three modules include a day-long intensive on the first Saturday of each module. After an online opening session, participants are invited to wander on the land for an extended time and to come back together into small groups to process. The intensives are an opportunity to connect more deeply with our places and with each other. They tend to bring transformative experiences and are an important part of immersing into each new module.
1:1 Mentoring
Six mentoring sessions with your Guide are included. These calls are a chance to receive personalized guidance to deeply explore, process, and apply course content and to integrate your own discoveries and wonderings. Mentors are highly trained and equipped with diverse modalities. These sessions are a supportive space to help you unpack, integrate, and digest your rich rewilding journey.
Ecosystem community
Our online community, The Ecosystem, is an active and dynamic space to engage with peers, find resources, explore prompts and invitations, and share your journey and insights alongside a community of like-hearted friends. Hosted on the Mighty Networks platform, The Ecosystem is an accessible and connective space. You will have access to the larger cohort, as well as a more intimate space with your council group.
Weekly invitations
Every week the Guides provide deepening invitations. These include readings and listening resources, journaling prompts and creative expression, reflection papers, poems, prayers and songs, and — most importantly — weekly invitations to wander in your own sacred wild places as you deepen into relationship with the more-than-human Others who share your Place.
"The time has come to lift that veil of fog and return to intimate relationship with the living world. More and more of us are taking our place, once again, as full participants in the web of life, which we remember is held together by love."
— Victoria Loorz, Church of the Wild
Graduate Testimonials
“(The program) was like this deep inhale — such a gift of time and space and community to learn and to grow. It was such a safe and sacred space. It's nice and cozy to just sit and read and learn, but there comes a point where you feel that now you've been given this gift. I feel like I've been given this gift to give to others.”
– Ash Rodriguez, chef and author
"For me, an identity shift happened. It has to do with being a woman who is in touch with the wisdom of the Earth, who is intuitive and wildly indigenous, who is whole, who sees the enchantment and the sacredness all around and wants to share that with the world. I am glad that I am confident in who I am and what I have to bring and give to the world. … Thank you again for giving the space to deepen into this journey."
— Wendy Janzen, wild church pastor
"This program has made me think so much about how the call of the wild is really a call to the deepest authentic self. It is about being and belonging rather than competing or strategizing. I’ve come to think of freedom as, really, the courage to live from your deepest, most authentic self. The self that is wild. That’s what Seminary of the Wild has been immensely helpful for me and I feel so much gratitude for it."
— Quentin Dunne, therapist
