Jo Swinney is the Director of Communication for A Rocha International, a global Christian nature conservation charity.

She’s also the author of several books, including The Whole Easter Story: Why the Cross is Good News for All Creation. On this Easter Monday she joined me to talk about the power of hope in helping us steward our planet well.

“Love is what generates the desire to care,” she told me. It all comes down to love.

Join us for a hopeful Easter episode about loving this beautiful planet, signs of hope springing up all around, and the good, creative work of conservation from elephants to coral.

Dan Van Voorhis is a professional podcaster with a PhD in Church History. His podcast, The Christian History Almanac offers daily 5-minute episodes all about the work of God in the world over the centuries. It’s one of my favorites.

Dan is also a friend, congregant, and the best interviewer I know. He graciously agreed to come on The Thing with Feathers and interview me about the launch of the audiobook for Looking Up that comes out today (yayyyyyyy!) on the one-year anniversary of the paperback’s launch.

Come join us as we chat about the ins and outs of audiobook recording, the joys and surprises at the ways Looking Up has made its way into the world, the birds of spring, and the special additions that come with the audio version of this book.

Lee Pfannmuller and Jerry Niemi know a thing or two about birds. With over one hundred years(!) of birding experience between them, they have spent their lives doing fieldwork related to conservation and ecology throughout the state of Minnesota and beyond.

Today we celebrate the publication of their new, beautiful book The Breeding Birds of Minnesota. We talk about everything from bird surveys to caring for creation to wrangling volunteers.

Find out the most frequently seen bird in Minnesota (the answer surprised me!), the most difficult places to perform bird surveys, and a great story about one place you should never drive a Prius.

Join us for this special, encouraging episode all about the beautiful birds of one of our most fantastic and ecologically fragile states.

Peter Harris co-founded A Rocha, a Christian nonprofit dedicated to conservation back in 1983. Together he and his wife Miranda built an organization that helped churches and Christians across the world work together to care for creation. Their vision was to build a global family of conservation organizations working together to live out God’s calling to care for creation ​and equip others to do likewise.

Today, A Rocha exists in more than 20 countries, from Portugal to the United States to India to Kenya. It continues to bring together those interested in conservation with people of faith, offering practical ways people can work to steward the good gift of creation God has given.

Friends, I could have spoken with Peter for days upon days. He is a wealth of wisdom, humility, and kindness, and I learned so much from our hour together. I’m so excited to share today’s episode with you - our discussion ranges from practical tips for conservation to the British evangelist John Stott’s love for birds to coping with grief to and loss to the hollowness of consumerism to how gosh-darned wonderful the avian world is.

“People are looking to understand,” said Peter.

I’ll also never forget our initial email exchange where I, a little star-struck by a guest who has done so much good in the world, told Peter I was looking forward to learning from him.

“We will learn from each other, Courtney,” he said.

Check out Peter’s beautiful book from the 1990s, Under the Bright Wings, about the faith-filled founding of A Rocha, too.

Enjoy this gift of a podcast, perfect for thinking more about the beauty of God’s creation and how we might better care for it.

Liz Charlotte Grant’s new book, Knock at the Sky: Seeking God in Genesis after Losing Faith in the Bible is a wild and wondrous read. And rightly so—anyone who’s spent any time in Genesis knows that it’s a delightfully odd and messy book.

Join us on this episode about hope, backyard chickens, and the surprising ways God sometimes shows up even when we feel we’ve lost our faith.

You may want to check out Liz’s fabulous Substack, The Empathy List, which has won Webby awards for its writing, as well as her haunting article on one of the saints of the evangelical church, Elisabeth Elliot.

Duane Bidwell is the author, most recently, of the new book After the Worst Day Ever: What Sick Kids Know About Sustaining Hope in Chronic Illness, with Beacon Press. He’s a professor, a chaplain, and an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA). He also loves a raven, but we’ll get to that.

Today’s episode is all about hope. Where we might find it, what we can learn from kids who have it—often against all odds—and how may serve as agents of hope to one another.

We also dabble a little in birds, don’t you worry.

Whether you’re feeling hopeful or hopeless, this is an episode not to be missed, my friends. And don’t forget to check out Duane’s beautiful book. You can find it anywhere books are sold.

Janet Hill first appeared on The Thing With Feathers back in 2023. I’d followed her wonderful photography for years and grown to appreciate her invitational style, and our conversation cheered and heartened me.

I couldn’t think of a better person to come on the show to talk all things winter birding than Janet. From Saskatoon to Newfoundland, from California gulls to Black-billed Magpies, join us for a conversation about listening, the benefits of keeping records, and why Janet believes in the importance of getting outside every single day, even in sub-zero weather.

Plus: an update on Mary the Blue Jay.

Follow Janet over on BlueSky to see more of her beautiful work.

Simon Stuart is the senior advisor to conservation at A Rocha. Until April of 2023, he served as Executive Director of A Rocha International. Simon has been instrumental in the species conservation movement around the world, including winning a Blue Planet Prize for his work with the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species.

Really, I could go on. Simon is a gracious, brilliant guy with a biography longer than my arm. (He spent his gap year with Jane Goodall! He was almost kidnapped twice!) But I’m going to let him tell you his story of conservation and hope in his own words.

Two things really stuck out to me about my conversation with Simon. First, his perspective that good, healthy change begins with “cultivating the love of what God has made.” With so much hopeless and despair around everything from the loss of biodiversity to climate change, it can be easy to descend into despair. But he reminded me that all good work begins and ends and has its roots in love.

Secondly, I’ve always wondered what it would be like to discover a new species. Simon has that story to share as well.

Buckle up for an adventure of an episode that takes us from Bath, England to Tanzania to India and back again. You won’t want to miss this one.

Roger Hutchison is an author, illustrator, and Christian educator in the Episcopal Church. He’s a two-time guest on our podcast, and we couldn’t think of a better fit for our end-of-year episode. Together we talk resolutions, words of the year, and what resolutions birds would make, if they made them.

Plus, we take a look at his just-about-to-be-released book, The Gift of Baptism. This beautiful children’s picture book took my breath away with its soulful writing and gorgeous illustrations by Claire Westwood.

Join us as we talk about finding hope even when *gestures broadly at everything.* Roger shares a bobcat story, how children are bearers and bringers of hope, and what sparrow-centric project he’s working on next.

Susanne Swing Thompson is the author of A Closer Look: The Neighborhood and the creative mind behind Wren Photos. Susanne is a big believer in the power and whimsy that can happen when we look more closely at our own backyards, streets, and local parks.

While birding can take us far afield - and this is fun! - when we tune into the birds, wildlife, and flora right on our own front steps, we can begin to find magic right where we are.

“I find myself wondering, ‘What is happening at home?’” said Susanne.

Join us for this episode as we look more closely at our own neighborhoods and encourage you to do the same.

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