A reminder about Catholic history and the gifts of nature

"In truth, not only is Herbal Medicine compatible with Christianity, but it was the Christian monks, nuns and priests of the Catholic Church who preserved the herbal knowledge of ancient Greece and Rome."

A must-read essay by Judson Carroll in Missio Dei tackles not just the subject of herbalism but in doing so it calls attention to an oft-forgotten reality about the Church: It was Catholic religious orders that preserved much of what had preceded them. Too often, the Church is seen as the undoer of ancient knowledge, when in fact quite the opposite is true.

It was (and is) the Catholic love of nature—of all the gifts God offers us in His created order—that allowed it to seek and find in nature the very substances that heal and bind.

For Catholic Ecologists, this is something not just to remember, but also to champion.

Read Carroll's full essay here.

Photo: Flickr/Hornbeam Art: Herbs