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Plundered: The Tangled Roots of Racial and Environmental Injustice
Two of the world's greatest crises, systemic racism and environmental destruction, share the same origin story. The two are rooted in economic forces that exploit and oppress both people and land.
Pastor David Swanson shows how we have failed our God-given duty as caretakers of creation and how that failure has resulted in the exploitation of people and the extraction of natural resources. Racial and ecological injustice share the same root cause-greed-that turns people and the natural world into commodities that are only valued for their utility. Yet Christians have the capacity to live in a way that nurtures racial and environmental justice simultaneously, honoring people and places in dynamic relationship with our Creator God. Swanson shows how we can become communities of caretakers, the way to restore our relationship with creation and each other, and the holistic justice that can result.
Pastor David Swanson shows how we have failed our God-given duty as caretakers of creation and how that failure has resulted in the exploitation of people and the extraction of natural resources. Racial and ecological injustice share the same root cause-greed-that turns people and the natural world into commodities that are only valued for their utility. Yet Christians have the capacity to live in a way that nurtures racial and environmental justice simultaneously, honoring people and places in dynamic relationship with our Creator God. Swanson shows how we can become communities of caretakers, the way to restore our relationship with creation and each other, and the holistic justice that can result.
208 pages, Paperback
Published October 8, 2024
9 people are currently reading
201 people want to read
About the author
David W. Swanson
5 books14 followersDavid is the founding pastor of New Community Covenant Church, a multiracial congregation on the South Side of Chicago. He also serves as the CEO of New Community Outreach, a non-profit organization working to reduce causes of trauma and raise opportunities for equity in Chicago. He previously served as a Director of Church Planting for the Evangelical Covenant Church. David and Maggie have been married for 21 years and have two amazing sons.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
March 5, 2025
Slimmed alot of it. But it is a very important book, espe cially in this 4 years
August 4, 2025
I was honored to receive an advance copy of David W. Swanson’s new book, Plundered: The Tangled Roots of Racial and Environmental Injustice. After admiring the beautifully textured cover, I spent a surprisingly long time soaking in the initial page of epigraphs—see the second slide. Each chapter also starts with well-curated quotes that invite reflection.
Pastor Swanson’s first book, Rediscipling the White Church, was one of my racial-justice-formative books in 2020. His new book clearly exposes the parallels, historical links, and shared underlying causes of systemic racism and environmental devastation. From solidly within his Christian perspective, Swanson draws wisdom and writing from diverse sources—not just the Bible and Christian theology, but also from indigenous writer Robin Wall Kimmerer, agrarian poet and activist Wendell Berry, social critic bell hooks, and many others. His suggested way forward is pastoral and communal: Nurture belonging through familiarity with the flora, fauna, and people of your specific location, nurture a practice of sabbath with your local community, and practice virtues to become people who can make “wise decisions in complex circumstances.”
The very localized, communal focus of Swanson’s anecdotes and exhortations moved me deeply and stirred hope for change. (I may have also stirred up feelings of regret for still sucking at gardening, but this just means I have room for growth. Pun intended.)
I truly loved the book more and more as I read it (and then read it again), and I’m hoping to find others who will read and discuss it!
Pastor Swanson’s first book, Rediscipling the White Church, was one of my racial-justice-formative books in 2020. His new book clearly exposes the parallels, historical links, and shared underlying causes of systemic racism and environmental devastation. From solidly within his Christian perspective, Swanson draws wisdom and writing from diverse sources—not just the Bible and Christian theology, but also from indigenous writer Robin Wall Kimmerer, agrarian poet and activist Wendell Berry, social critic bell hooks, and many others. His suggested way forward is pastoral and communal: Nurture belonging through familiarity with the flora, fauna, and people of your specific location, nurture a practice of sabbath with your local community, and practice virtues to become people who can make “wise decisions in complex circumstances.”
The very localized, communal focus of Swanson’s anecdotes and exhortations moved me deeply and stirred hope for change. (I may have also stirred up feelings of regret for still sucking at gardening, but this just means I have room for growth. Pun intended.)
I truly loved the book more and more as I read it (and then read it again), and I’m hoping to find others who will read and discuss it!
October 8, 2024
I’m grateful for David Swanson's teaching about the link between racism and environmental destruction. It's a heavy topic, but he approaches it with honesty, humility, and hope.
January 7, 2025
Summary: The tangled roots of racial and environmental injustice. Traces exploitation and oppression of people and land to a common root of greed.
The basic premise of this book is that systemic racism and environmental destruction stem from a common root. Specifically, greed, and its outworking in theft, in the eyes of David T., Swanson, are the sources of what he sees as two intertwined ills. Often, those subject to racial injustice also suffer from depredations on the environment. The point of this book is not to argue what are disputed ideas in some quarters nor to propose policies for society as a whole. Instead, Swanson asks how churches might engage in caretaking of both people who have suffered injustice and the land they inhabit, often in urban settings.
Swanson comes uniquely qualified to address these questions. After training as an outdoor educator, Swanson experienced a call to establish a church on the South Side of Chicago, New Community Covenant Church, where he has lived with his family and worked the past fourteen years. The book reflects his own efforts to love and care for the people and place of the South Side of Chicago, specifically the Bronzeville neighborhood.
Before addressing his key insight, Swanson begins with the gift of creation, weaving biblical narrative and insights of Indigenous Christians into his sabbath day walks by Lake Michigan near the Center of Science and Industry, through the woodlands, canals, and lagoons of what was the site of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. From here, he considers our vocation, which he describes as priestly caretakers. As priests, we both bless the Creator and the creation. As caretakers, we seek the flourishing of all God’s creation, recognizing that our flourishing depends upon it.
Then, Swanson explores what we have actually done. We have so refashioned creation, resulting in mass extinctions and changing weather patterns. Scientists contend we have entered a new era in Earth’s existence, the Anthropocene. We have pursued extractive and exploitative policies not only with the creation but with ethnic minorities, the Black and Brown peoples of our country. As a result, these people often suffer the worst effects of our environmental depredations in what is called environmental racism. As Christians, we have often been complicit. Real healing can only begin with repentance, leading to repair, reconciliation, and renewal.
Part of how this happens, Swanson contends, is through our detachment from our place. We often do not know where our water, food, energy, clothing, and other necessities come from. And so we often can be oblivious to the exploitative and extractive practices implicit in our existence. But there is hope and the last two chapters in part one begin exploring what priestly caretaking under Christ’s redemptive work might look like in our communities, from gardens, to welcome of newcomers, to fighting for the quality of local schools.
All this comes in the first part, under the heading “tangled roots.” The second part is headed ” becoming naturalized.” Instead of detachment, Swanson considers what it means to become indigenous to a place. Swanson urges three practices to nurture our relationship with our place and its people. Instead of detachment, we nurture belonging, listening to and learning about our community. Instead of unceasing exploitation, we sabbath, resting both ourselves and the rest of creation and practicing generosity. Finally, in place of greed, we nurture virtue–prudence, justice, courage, temperance, faith, hope, and love.
Priestly caretaking is not idealistic utopianism. Rather it is a form of “long obedience in the same direction. Swanson writes:
“Caretaking in the ruins of industrialized extraction and exploitation is a generational commitment. Who can say how long it will take for a racialized people centered on Jesus and pursuing repair together to find that creation has re-exerted its formational power over them? How long will it take for a people who’ve been severed from the earth to learn to walk humbly and gently among their creaturely neighbors? There is no program for this, no curriculum or metrics. There is only the good and slow work of learning together how to exist as a blessing and a gift.”
What I appreciate about this book is that it doesn’t try to do too much. It doesn’t propose macro solutions for racism or environmental problems. Swanson does for urban communities what Wendell Berry does for rural farming communities. Both focus on care for people with names and their place. We can’t seek restoration everywhere if we don’t practice it somewhere. Swanson invites us to begin where we are to engage the long, slow work of community caretaking.
_____________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
The basic premise of this book is that systemic racism and environmental destruction stem from a common root. Specifically, greed, and its outworking in theft, in the eyes of David T., Swanson, are the sources of what he sees as two intertwined ills. Often, those subject to racial injustice also suffer from depredations on the environment. The point of this book is not to argue what are disputed ideas in some quarters nor to propose policies for society as a whole. Instead, Swanson asks how churches might engage in caretaking of both people who have suffered injustice and the land they inhabit, often in urban settings.
Swanson comes uniquely qualified to address these questions. After training as an outdoor educator, Swanson experienced a call to establish a church on the South Side of Chicago, New Community Covenant Church, where he has lived with his family and worked the past fourteen years. The book reflects his own efforts to love and care for the people and place of the South Side of Chicago, specifically the Bronzeville neighborhood.
Before addressing his key insight, Swanson begins with the gift of creation, weaving biblical narrative and insights of Indigenous Christians into his sabbath day walks by Lake Michigan near the Center of Science and Industry, through the woodlands, canals, and lagoons of what was the site of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. From here, he considers our vocation, which he describes as priestly caretakers. As priests, we both bless the Creator and the creation. As caretakers, we seek the flourishing of all God’s creation, recognizing that our flourishing depends upon it.
Then, Swanson explores what we have actually done. We have so refashioned creation, resulting in mass extinctions and changing weather patterns. Scientists contend we have entered a new era in Earth’s existence, the Anthropocene. We have pursued extractive and exploitative policies not only with the creation but with ethnic minorities, the Black and Brown peoples of our country. As a result, these people often suffer the worst effects of our environmental depredations in what is called environmental racism. As Christians, we have often been complicit. Real healing can only begin with repentance, leading to repair, reconciliation, and renewal.
Part of how this happens, Swanson contends, is through our detachment from our place. We often do not know where our water, food, energy, clothing, and other necessities come from. And so we often can be oblivious to the exploitative and extractive practices implicit in our existence. But there is hope and the last two chapters in part one begin exploring what priestly caretaking under Christ’s redemptive work might look like in our communities, from gardens, to welcome of newcomers, to fighting for the quality of local schools.
All this comes in the first part, under the heading “tangled roots.” The second part is headed ” becoming naturalized.” Instead of detachment, Swanson considers what it means to become indigenous to a place. Swanson urges three practices to nurture our relationship with our place and its people. Instead of detachment, we nurture belonging, listening to and learning about our community. Instead of unceasing exploitation, we sabbath, resting both ourselves and the rest of creation and practicing generosity. Finally, in place of greed, we nurture virtue–prudence, justice, courage, temperance, faith, hope, and love.
Priestly caretaking is not idealistic utopianism. Rather it is a form of “long obedience in the same direction. Swanson writes:
“Caretaking in the ruins of industrialized extraction and exploitation is a generational commitment. Who can say how long it will take for a racialized people centered on Jesus and pursuing repair together to find that creation has re-exerted its formational power over them? How long will it take for a people who’ve been severed from the earth to learn to walk humbly and gently among their creaturely neighbors? There is no program for this, no curriculum or metrics. There is only the good and slow work of learning together how to exist as a blessing and a gift.”
What I appreciate about this book is that it doesn’t try to do too much. It doesn’t propose macro solutions for racism or environmental problems. Swanson does for urban communities what Wendell Berry does for rural farming communities. Both focus on care for people with names and their place. We can’t seek restoration everywhere if we don’t practice it somewhere. Swanson invites us to begin where we are to engage the long, slow work of community caretaking.
_____________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
January 1, 2025
SUCH an insightful, soul-provoking book. I had never really considered the connections between the use of the land's resources and use of people as resources as connected, but now I can't see how I didn't make that connection long ago, it's so obvious! I really loved how Swanson weaved historical anecdotes with spiritual and biblical concepts and the "whole-being" focus of loving our "place" where we have been planted, coaxing life gently from the earth and from those around us, and ourselves. Everything in life truly is connected, and this makes it feel a little smaller, more manageable, while still having larger-than-life impact. Sometimes changing the world feels so astronomically impossible, such a large scale that we can't even attempt it. This brings it down to local community, truly committed to growing together, literally and metaphorically, nurturing humans, creatures and the land all in harmony. A slow process to be sure, but if they can manage it in urban Chicago, certainly the concepts can be applied anywhere!
January 6, 2025
The power of this book is not just it’s well articulated Scripture-inspired vision or it’s insightful revealing of how economic exploitation and human exploitation go hand-in-hand. The power of this book is in its radical call for repair, not just tweaking systems, and the lived experience that animates each page.
May 18, 2025
Very thought provoking book - would enjoy reading it again with a group to discuss. The second half was very practical without being formulaic at all - and I am thinking about how to grow into presently caretaking both of our land and in my work at school.
November 27, 2024
There is so much to commend in this book by David Swanson. From page 3: "This book describes how two of the world's great crises, systemic racism and environmental destruction, share the same tangled origins: greed and its ravenous manifestation, theft." Swanson explores how we are all meant to thrive in God's creation, how greed has decimated the earth and often the poor, and what we as people of faith can do about this injustice. Deeply insightful and encouraging.
February 14, 2025
One of the best books I've read this year. Swanson takes journalistic and academic research and brings the issue down to a practical level. Beautifully written, challenging, and inspirational.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews