More Trees Fall

by

Special to United Methodist Insight | June 25, 2025

Three years ago I was prompted to write a post about the deaths of several distinguished figures in various fields, using Maya Angelou’s poem “When Great Trees Fall.” The recent deaths of four religious leaders who impacted me greatly inspired these further reflections.

Pope Francis (1936-2025)

The death of Pope Francis on April 21 made international headlines, as Catholics and non-Catholics alike mourned the passing of the pontiff who lived simply, shunning Vatican opulence and championing the poor. Sharing the same Latin American roots as Liberation Theology, he clearly embraced the movement’s compassion for the poor and critique of western development, even as he distanced himself from its political associations with Marxism.

God’s special concern for the poor runs throughout Francis’s encyclical Laudato Si’ (2015) the first papal letter to address the effects of climate change. He followed up that missive in 2023 with Laudate Deum, which directly critiques the world’s failure to make the necessary changes to avert climate disaster.

For many of us, having the most prominent Christian leader in the world speak so clearly on the issue that holds foremost concern for us was game-changing. His words and example energized the religious environmental movement and continues to call attention to the ethical and spiritual dimensions of climate change.

John Cobb (1925-2024)

Over 40 years earlier, theologian John Cobb had written Is It Too Late? An Ecological Theology (1972), the first monograph to look at the ecological crisis through an ethical lens. Cobb, who died on December 26, just weeks shy of his 100th birthday, was key to the development of process theology, which describes a cosmic process of change that affects and is affected by both God and humanity. Relationally lies at the core of process thought, and Cobb recognized the interconnected nature of creation, the global economy, and our relationships with God and each other.

Although I have not studied process theology formally, it resonates with my own theology and apparently with Methodist founder John Wesley, who I did study extensively. After my theology professor Sallie McFague read a paper I wrote about Wesley and ecological theology, she remarked, “Now I understand why all the process theologians are Methodist.”1

I also encountered Cobb’s writing in interfaith circles, through his book Beyond Dialogue: Toward a Mutual Transformation of Christianity and Buddhism (1982). In this work and in Christ in a Pluralistic Age (1975), he guides Christians in rethinking theological models in relationship to other cultures and religions.

Born in Japan, the child of missionary parents, John Cobb continued to engage with Asian countries. Most noticeably, he contributed toward China’s understanding of ecological civilization as a way of moving from an industrial society to one that considers the well-being of both people and the planet.

At age 99, John Cobb approached death with the same curiosity and openness that marked his life and scholarship, writing “I am ready to be surprised. I look forward to a new adventure.”

Martin Marty (1928-2025)

Likewise sociologist of religion Martin Marty eagerly anticipated his death, which came on February 25 at age 97. Remembering his “relentlessly cheerful father” in the pages of The Christian Century (May 2025, pg. 1), Peter Marty wrote that he “exited this life with the same confidence and joy with which he lived it,” continuing: “His anticipated appointment with the Lord of eternity was something he embraced all his life.”

Also like Cobb, Martin Marty was prolific, writing more than 60 books and countless articles, including bi-weekly columns in The Christian Century during the half a century he served as its editor. A Lutheran pastor, he was active in social and religious movements, serving as a Protestant observer during the Second Vatican Council and marching in Selma, Alabama, with Martin Luther King Jr.

I encountered Marty’s works in studying religious pluralism as a Ph.D. student. His 1997 book The One and the Many: America’s Struggle for the Common Good notes how culture wars have strained our country’s notion of a shared heritage. Published in 2004, his book When Faiths Collide offers strategies for accommodating religious difference, including seeking to learn about other faiths and looking at our own religion through the lens of the other. Like Cobb, Martin Marty saw religious diversity not as a threat but as an opportunity to enrich our lives and culture through deeper engagement.

Walter Brueggemann (1933-2025)

On June 5, Hebrew Bible scholar Walter Brueggemann died at age 92. Author of more than 100 books and numerous articles, he wrote the authoritative Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy (1997) and dozens of shorter texts, including books of poems and prayers. The range of his writing and his commitment to church renewal is evident in his weekly columns for Church Anew, which he posted through mid-May.

A rhetorical critic, he explored the power and influence of language, both scriptural texts and how we preach. Required reading for my homiletics classes included Finally Comes the Poet: Daring Speech for Proclamation (1989), which urges preachers to be poets that speak to a prose-flattened world, and his well-known The Prophetic Imagination (1978). In my own preaching, I often recall his admonition that prophecy involves both criticizing by pointing out injustice and energizing by offering a vision of a better world.

My copy of his short book Praying the Psalms (1982) is well-marked and contains my homemade index of the psalms he references throughout the text, so I could consult him in preaching or leading Bible studies on specific psalms.

Cobb, Marty, and Brueggemann were shaped by mainline Protestant traditions during those churches’ mid-20th century heyday. Like Martin Marty, Walter Brueggemann was an ordained minister (United Church of Christ), and John Cobb was an active United Methodist. All of them modeled a life-time of faith-informed scholarship that spoke to the challenges and changes the church faced during their long lives.

Like that of Pope Francis, their theological and critical work was deeply rooted in society, and their religious scholarship was never an abstraction but a lived reality that had consequences and the potential to change the world. Their legacies are borne not just by scholars they trained, but by pastors who have carried their voices into pulpits across the country. They all helped to shape my personal faith and my ministry, and I am profoundly grateful for any aspect of their work that I have been able to convey to others.

Rest in peace, gentlemen.

  1. In addition to John Cobb, Methodist process theologians include Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, Catherine Keller, and Schubert Ogden. ↩︎

The Rev. Jane Ellen Nickell is a retired clergy member of the West Virginia Annual Conference of The United Methodist Church. Chaplain Emerita of Allegheny College, In retirement she is devoting time and energies to fighting our addiction to fossil fuels. This post is republished with permission from her blog, "A Nickell for Your Thoughts."