The Ethics of Local Belonging: A Theology of Naming Place

This article offers a theological description of one practice necessary for good local belonging: the creative practice of naming local creatures, both human and non-human. I explore the practice of naming as forming local belonging in dialogue with new nature writers in the British Isles and Jean-Louis Chrétien. I offer a brief review of the scope of theologies of place in the United Kingdom before turning to the themes of displacement and naming in new British nature writing. Finally, I use Jean-Louis Chrétien's theological accounts of naming and corporate prayer, to examine the effect of naming in transforming one's relation to one's locality, and propose that the Church's creative participation in local naming—especially in prayer—offers a transforming narrative as to the kinds of local belonging which ought to be pursued.