The Wilderness Can't Save You

being an introduction to the July Material Mysticism column at Comment

One of our campsites this summer in the Boundary Waters this May

It is not surprising that our being asphyxiated by technology leads to a longing for “wildness.” Hence the proliferation of “Wild God” albums, substacks, books and programs. Much of it is good stuff. Some of it, however, assumes that wildness necessarily means so “wild” as to be beyond Christianity. One recent book even promotes wilderness experiences as a substitute for boring ol’ church, which of course, assumes a degree of physical ability that only applies to some. It’s hard to tell a grieving septuagenarian widow to strap on her Tevas for a 200 rod portage. Such a posture also assumes you don’t get struck by lightning or drown. I love this opening line of one recent well researched book on Boundary Waters horror stories entitled Last Entry Point: “Jordan Grider’s skull is still out there. At least whatever’s left of it. The wolves took the rest.”

There is, of course, a long tradition of American wilderness writers forcing an artificial choice between Christianity and “the wilderness.” Some of it is well written. Most of it is laughably shortsighted, blissfully unaware of centuries of Christian nature mysticism. Usually such accounts leave out Indigenous people, for whom the concept of “wilderness” has not been an unalloyed good. And when such account are not ignoring Native Americans, they often naively romanticize them, which is insulting in a different way. Almost never do such accounts include Indigenous Christians, which some post-Christian wilderness writers might find to be (yet again) a serious inconvenience.

Still, I think ultimately such post-Christian wilderness accounts need to be charitably refuted not from a desk, but from the wilderness itself, while completely under creation’s captivating spell. Here’s my attempt to do just that, being this month’s Material Mysticism column at Comment. It also, I hope, offers at least one positive report amidst bad news this summer regarding liberal arts education. For there is nothing about the course we teach in Minnesota/Ontario through Wheaton College’s HoneyRock program that can be even remotely rivaled by AI.