2014 Theses Master's

The Anticipatory Community and The Yoga of Ecology

Fici, Christopher Lawrence

This thesis will explore the question of what defines and constitutes the anticipatory community in relation to the yoga of ecology through two primary ingredients. The first ingredient we will explore is the existential ingredient. We will examine the questions of why and how the internal pollution of our human nature creates the systematic pollution which defies anticipation, and also how the inner potential of our human nature creates the fierce potential to achieve anticipation. We will explore this question via rubrics considering the nature of the alienated ego from the thought of Reinhold Niebuhr along with voices in comparative concert and contrast and to Niebuhr from Hindu and other indigenous traditions of defiance against privilege and the macrocosmic constructs of turbo-capitalism. Secondly, we will connect our understanding of the existential ingredient of the anticipatory community and dive deeper into the spiritual ingredient of the anticipatory community, through the lens of the yoga of the ecology. This final section will frame this conception of the yoga of ecology through the value of bhakti-yoga, or devotion to the personal representation of the Divine Goddess/God, primarily represented here through the lens of the Gaudiya Vaisnava tradition, as a foundation of being and expression which inherently creates ecologically-sound values and practices. As much as possible within the rubric of this thesis, theological comparisons and dialogue between traditions will be brought to light to show how this conception of the yoga of ecology can be translated and applied across the spectrum of orthodoxy and orthopraxy. This final section will accentuate and unpack the fundamental argument of this thesis, that the anticipatory community must have a spiritual foundation in order for it to shape and offer an effectual response to our existential ecological crisis.