A very erudite quote from Prince Charles below posits the many crises we face are rooted in an inner crisis of the soul. I totally agree. The Transition movement makes this point eloquently by addressing the need for outer and inner Transition, with the inner transition being a different way of moving and being in the world deeply rooted in Permaculture design principles.
"When we hear talk of an 'environmental crisis' or even of a 'financial crisis,' I would suggest that this is actually describing the outward consequences of a deep, inner crisis of the soul. It is a crisis in our relationship with – and our perception of – Nature, and it is born of Western culture being dominated for at least two hundred years by a mechanistic and reductionist approach to our scientific understanding of the world around us. So I would like you to consider very seriously today whether a big part of the solution to all of our worldwide “crises” does not lie simply in more and better technology, but in the recovery of the soul to the mainstream of our thinking. Our science and technology cannot do this. Only sacred traditions have the capacity to help this happen."
The Prince of Wales made these comments in a recent speech on Islam and the Environment at the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford University. Matt McDermott at Planet Green, wrote an excellent assessment of the Prince's speech on Planet Green today, and notes the prince "brings up some themes which continue to be overlooked by the mainstream of the green movement, tragically." Right on Matt!
McDermott writes:
"What hits exactly the right note for me is the Prince's accurate identification at what really lies behind our twinned and ongoing environmental and economic crisis-as-norm. It is constantly searching for external solutions to problems to the exclusion of considering that, at the least partly, the issue is internal to humanity. Put plainly it is always attempt[ing] and expecting the world to adapt to our desires, rather than adapting ourselves to it."
Just imagine what could happen if we all took this kind of transitioning seriously. What an extraordinary sight to behold.
McDermott's full comments on Prince Charles' speech are here.; full transcript of the Prince of Wale's speech is here.

