Cloud and Fire Programme Outline

Cloud and Fire explores new dimensions – emotional, pastoral, spiritual and moral – of human life in the Anthropocene and in the shadow of existential climate risk.

Through the model of a retreat in daily life, participants accompany each other for the spiritual, emotional and vocational journey further into environmental breakdown. Against the background of the Exodus we seek to discern or reappraise our vocations as we travel towards an unknown future. We are nourished from scriptural narratives and images which are both Judaeo-Christian and universal, terrestrial and transcendent.

It is intended to enable those in Christian ministry (e.g. clergy, spiritual directors and members of religious communities) to deepen their theological, spiritual and pastoral responses for the new realities. The series extends across several months, with significant personal reflection in between group sessions online or in person. It follows the shape of the Easter cycle and the Exodus journey, in exploring pain and potential despair, uncertainty and unknowing, regeneration and the remaking of mission and community.