Jason John

I am a Uniting Church minister (deacon) who has spent most of my ministry helping the church and others live better within the Earth Community.

I've started a couple of ecofaith communities, exploring what it means to be a Christian who is informed and shaped by the new creation stories coming to us from the fields of evolution, ecology, and cosmology. I've turned some of that into a few books, most recently one on the implications for faithful sex in the 21st century.

My PhD thesis on evolution, ecology and theology was my opportunity to start integrating my past studies in zoology and environmental studies with my faith, and with my profession as a minister of religion. It was prompted by the number of students I met who thought they had to choose between being a Christian, or believing science.

I have a passion for permaculture which informs the slow unfolding of our forest home, where we've just finished wombling a "bathroom" and now have running warm water most days. It's a very slow process.

I appreciate the Uniting Church's professed desire for an intellectually credible faith, shaped by contact with contemporary thought. I agree with its rejection of biblical literalism and fundamentalism, and its desire to remain a place where our diverse membership can continue as pilgrims of faith together.

I've been an athiest, agnostic, a biblical literalist and an evolutionary Christian, so am well placed to co-operate with any people of good will to work for the common good of this our Earth family.