Jim Robinson, Ph.D.

Dr. Robinson teaches courses that invite students to reflect on the intersection of religion, ecology, and social justice. His academic work is rooted in the fields of Ecotheology and Religion and Ecology. In addition, he has devoted much of his work to engaging with the insights of Thomas Merton and Rosemary Radford Ruether. He is actively involved in a number of lay Catholic communities committed to ecology and social justice, including Agape Community in Hardwick, MA, Benincasa Community in Guilford, CT, and Maryhouse Catholic Worker in NYC.

Dr. Robinson teaches courses that invite students to reflect on the intersection of religion, ecology, and social justice, from "Religion and the Natural World" to "Spirituality, Advocacy, and Activism." All of his courses incorporate service-learning, in an effort to weave together theory and praxis and to promote experiential learning. He serves as the co-chair of the Committee on Environmental Sustainability on campus, and as the faculty advisor for the Food Recovery Network. In 2023, he received The Catherine McCabe Award for Innovation and Excellence in Teaching at Iona. 

His academic work is rooted in the fields of Ecotheology and Religion and Ecology. In addition, he has devoted much of his work to engaging with the insights of Thomas Merton and Rosemary Radford Ruether. He is actively involved in the College Theology Society, where he served as the co-convenor of the "Theology, Ecology, and Natural Science" unit (2022-2025), and the International Thomas Merton Society, where he serves as co-chair of the Daggy Scholars Committee, while also serving on the Membership Committee and the Tuesdays with Merton Committee. He is a GreenFaith Fellow (2021) and an ITMS Shannon Fellow (2019-2020). His forthcoming book, Beyond Factory Farming: A Contemplative-Prophetic Approach to Food will be published by Orbis Books in June, 2026. 

As Director of the Deignan Institute, Dr. Robinson works on offering a Speaker Series, which brings activists, artists, scholars, and farmers to campus each semester. Through the Institute, he also accompanies students to off-campus opportunities, from participating in an academic conference in Denver, CO, to cooking large trays of pasta, rice, and lentils at the Catholic Worker, to marching across the Brooklyn Bridge for a more just and sustainable future. He is actively involved in a number of lay Catholic communities committed to ecology and social justice. He volunteers regularly   at Maryhouse Catholic Worker in NYC. He serves on the board of Agape Community in Hardwick, MA and Benincasa Community in Guilford, CT.  Inspired by Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin, he believes that our work is to "create a society in which it is easier for people to be good."

• 2025 “Beyond Factory Farming: Insights from Thomas Merton and Thich Nhat Hanh,” 
  at the International Thomas Merton Society’s 19th General Meeting, “The Calligraphy of Snow and Rock and Sky: Thomas Merton and the Spirit of Place,” Regis University, Denver, CO, June 19-22, 2025.
• 2025 “Integral Ecology, Ecological Conversion, and the Catholic Worker: Historical Resonances and Future Possibilities,” at the Dorothy Day Symposium, “Practices of Peace in the Year of Jubilee,” Manhattan University, Bronx, N.Y., March 29, 2025
• 2025 “From Scotosis to Ecological Conversion: Recognizing, Resisting, and Transforming Factory Farming,” invited speaker at the Annual Lonergan Colloquium, “Integral Ecology Colloquium on the 10th Anniversary of Laudato Si,’”Marquette University, Milwaukee, WI, March 7-8, 2025.
• 2023 "Both 'Hippie Monk' and Distanced Critic: Thomas Merton and the 1960's Counterculture,” at the International Thomas Merton Society’s 18th General Meeting, “Sophia Comes Forth, Reaching,” St. Mary’s College, South Bend, IN June 22-25, 2023.
• 2022 “‘Jesus Christ Destroys All Our Dualisms’: Raimon Panikkar’s Cosmotheandric Christology,” at the Catholic Theological Society of America’s Seventy-Sixth Annual Convention, “Thinking Catholic Interreligiously,” Atlanta, GA, June 9-12, 2022.
• 2022 “Re-Turning to Ruether: Toward an Anti-Racist, Anti-Sexist Integral Ecology,” at the College Theology Society’s Sixty-Eighth Annual Convention, “‘Why We Can’t Wait’: Racism and the Church” (online), June 2-4, 2022.
• 2022 “Living Laudato si’ While Evolving Beyond It: Embodying a Feminist ‘Integral Ecology’ at Agape Community and Benincasa Community” with Suzanne Belote Shanley and Karen Gargamelli-McCreight at the Inaugural Conference on “Ecological Spiritualities,” Harvard Divinity School, Cambridge, MA (hybrid conference), April 27-30, 2022.
• 2021 “Eco-Spirituality & Eco-Justice: Embodying Inner and Outer Transformation at Agape Community,” at the American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, San Antonio, TX, November 20-23, 2021.
• 2021 “The ‘Age of Rosemarys:’ Merton’s Engagement with Rosemary Radford Ruether and Rosemary Haughton,” at the International Thomas Merton Society’s 17th General Meeting, “Thou Inward Stranger” (online), June 23-26, 2021.
• 2021 “From the Technocratic Paradigm to Postures of Praise: Resisting and Transforming Factory Farms,” at the College Theology Society’s Sixty-Seventh Annual Convention, “The Human in a Dehumanizing World: Re-Examining Theological Anthropology and Its Implications” (online), June 3-5, 2021.
• 2020 “Spiraling into Wider Justice: The Life, Legacy, and Insights of Rosemary Radford Ruether,” at the American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting (online), November 29-December 10, 2020.
• 2019 “To Worry About Birds and People: Pesticides, Nuclear War, and the False Self,” at the International Thomas Merton Society’s 16th General Meeting, “O Peace, Bless This Mad Place,” Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, CA, June 27-30, 2019.
• 2019 “From Ecocide to Ecological Harmony: The Need for Building ‘Base Communities of Celebration and Resistance,’” at the “Life in the Anthropocene: Theology and the Environment” conference, Fordham University, Bronx, NY: April 11-12, 2019.
• 2016 “The ‘Great Work’ of Ecological Conversion,” at the “Ecological Spirituality and Laudato Si” conference, The Thomas Berry Forum for Ecological Dialogue, Iona College, New Rochelle, NY, October 29, 2016.
• 2016 “Taking on the Gaze of Jesus: Perceiving the Factory Farm in a Sacramental World,” at the “Oxford Summer School on the Ethics of Eating Animals” conference, St. Stephen’s House, Oxford University, Oxford, England, July 24-27, 2016.
• 2016 “‘The Universe Unfolds in God’: Sacred Seeds, Ecological Contemplation and Laudato Si,” at “The Spirit of Sustainable Agriculture” conference, Harvard Divinity School, Cambridge, MA: March 31-April 1, 2016.
• 2015 “Praying with Seeds: Contemplative Ecology and Ritual Resistance” at the “Awakening from the Inhuman: Religion and Resistance” conference, Fordham University, Bronx, NY: May 2, 2015.
• 2011 “Anandamayi Ma and Ammachi: Hindu Women Embodying Religious Authority,” at the New Jersey Women’s and Gender Studies Consortium, Brookdale Community College, Lincroft, NJ: March, 2011.

• 2025 “Toward an Intersectional Integral Ecology,” in The New Ecozoic Reader: Special Issue on Religion and Ecology, ed. Sam C. King and Sam Mickey, Chapel Hill, NC: Center for Ecozoic Studies, 2025, 99-104
• 2024 "Both 'Hippie Monk' and Distanced Critic: Thomas Merton and the 1960s Counterculture," in The Merton Annual 36, ed. Bernadette McNary-Zak and David Golemboski, Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae, 2024, 212-222.
• 2024 Review of Bill Morgan, Thomas Merton, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and the Protection of all Beings, in The Merton Annual 36, ed. Bernadette McNary-Zak and David Golemboski, Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae, 2024, 260-263.
• 2023 “Encountering the Divine, Resisting Patriarchy: Rosemary Radford Ruether’s Prophetic Catholicism,” in Religions 14, no. 10: 1230,
• 2023 Review of Thomas Merton, Notes on Genesis and Exodus edited and with an introduction by Patrick F. O’Connell, in The Merton Annual 35, ed. Deborah Pope Kehoe and David Golemboski, Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae, 2023, 231-236.
• 2022 “Gurumatha Amma,” in Encyclopedia of Indian Religions: Hinduism and Tribal Religions, ed. Jeffrey D. Long, Pankaj Jain, Rita Sherma, and Madhu Khanna (New York: Springer, 2022), 550-552.
• 2022 “Shri Anandi Ma” in Encyclopedia of Indian Religions: Hinduism and Tribal Religions, ed. Jeffrey D. Long, Pankaj Jain, Rita Sherma, and Madhu Khanna (Dordrecht: Springer, 2022), 1480-1483.
• 2021 "'The Age of Rosemarys': Thomas Merton's Engagement with Rosemary Radford Ruether and Rosemary Haughton,” in The Merton Annual 34, ed. Deborah Pope Kehoe and David Golemboski, Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae, 2021, 120-128.
• 2018 “Taking on the Gaze of Jesus: Perceiving the Factory Farm in a Sacramental World,” in Ethical Vegetarianism and Veganism, ed. Andrew Linzey and Clair Linzey, London: Routledge, 2018, 173-181.
• 2012 “The Place of Suffering and the Way to Liberation in Prometheus Unbound and ‘Lines Written Among the Euganean Hills,’” in The Drew Review. Madison, NJ: Drew University, 2012.