Exploring Nature, Culture and Inner Life The New School at Commonweal

~Co-presented by The New School at Commonweal and CancerChoices~
Join Thomas Smith, MD, with Host Michael Lerner for a conversation about easing cancer pain and suffering. Uncontrolled pain creates unnecessary suffering, but when pain is controlled, quality of life improves dramatically. Compassionate, expert help is available for people with cancer experiencing pain.
Thomas J Smith, MD
Thomas is a professor of oncology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and director of Palliative Medicine for Johns Hopkins Medicine.
He has a lifelong interest in better symptom management, communication, and improving access to high quality affordable care. Thomas is a fellow in the American College of Physicians, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, and the American Association of Hospice and Palliative Medicine and is listed among the top oncologists and palliative care specialists in the country. He has taught palliative concepts in more than a dozen countries and helped start over 100 new programs.
Host Michael Lerner
Michael is the president and co-founder of Commonweal. His principal work at Commonweal is with the Cancer Help Program, CancerChoices.org, the Omega Resilience Projects, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and The New School at Commonweal. He was the recipient of a MacArthur Prize Fellowship for contributions to public health in 1983 and is author of Choices in Healing: Integrating the Best of Conventional and Complementary Therapies (MIT Press).

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

What Stories Does the Land Hold? is a conversation series co-presented by the Center for Humans and Nature and The New School at Commonweal as part of the Center’s Questions for a Resilient Future Series
Join Host Christine Luckasavitch (Anishinaabeg and mixed settler) in conversation with Māori artist, designer, activist, and researcher Tanya Te Miringa Te Rorarangi Ruka. Tanya’s work is deeply rooted in Indigenous environmental knowledges, encouraging a deeper connection to ancestral place on a global scale through her artistic practices. This conversation will center around storytelling, community building, working alongside our plant relatives, and Indigenous futurisms.
Tanya Te Miringa Te Rorarangi Ruka
Tanya is a Māori Indigenous artist and designer living in Te Whānganui-a-Tara, Aotearoa (Wellington, Capital City of New Zealand). She is of Ngati Pakau, Te Uriroroi, Te Parawhau, Te Mahurehure Ngapuhi, and Waitaha descent. She is active in environmental issues from an Indigenous perspective in Aotearoa and globally. Working with the Waitaha Executive Grandmothers Council, she has been documenting and mapping the sacred stories of her Tupuna ancestors as evidence for tribal environmental issues involving land and water protection claims through the Treaty of Waitangi. As a Māori artist she is inspired by her ancestry and the creation stories that place the land as Ancestor and the Master Navigator voyagers of the Pacific who always kept their eyes on the horizon in hopeful anticipation, bringing the tribe safely to land. You can hear her speak on YouTube here: City Talks: Kaupapa Mauri.
Christine Luckasavitch
Christine is an Omàmìwininì Madaoueskarini Anishinaabekwe (a woman of the Madawaska River Algonquin people) and belongs to the Crane Clan, and is of mixed settler ancestry including Irish, Swedish, and Polish. Christine continues to live in her ancestral territory, land that her Ancestors have called home since time immemorial. Christine is the owner of two Indigenous knowledge-based companies, Waaseyaa Consulting and Waaseyaa Cultural Tours, both dedicated to enhancing the awareness and understanding of Algonquin Anishinaabeg history and culture. She is executive director of Native Land Digital, an Indigenous-led not-for-profit dedicated to providing free education of Indigenous territories and knowledge systems across the world. Christine has worked as an archaeologist, educator, and in the realm of Indigenous politics. She spends most of her time out on the land, and has a keen interest in learning more about traditional plant use. She is currently writing her first book, Ondjitigweyaa Madaoueskarini Omàmìwininì (Algonquin People of the Madawaska River Headwaters).

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

~ Co-presented with CancerChoices ~

Join Commonweal Cancer Help Program alumna Sue Mondello with Host Michael Lerner as they explore her hospice experience and the view from the edge of life.

Host Michael Lerner
Michael is the president and co-founder of Commonweal. His principal work at Commonweal is with the Cancer Help Program, CancerChoices.org, the Omega Resilience Projects, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and The New School at Commonweal. He was the recipient of a MacArthur Prize Fellowship for contributions to public health in 1983 and is author of Choices in Healing: Integrating the Best of Conventional and Complementary Therapies (MIT Press).

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

Join Host Michael Lerner for another series of spiritual biography conversations with social activist and community leader Orland Bishop. Together, they look at his life and work, working from his book, The Seventh Shrine: Meditations on the African Spiritual Journey from the Middle Passage to the Mountaintop. This four-part conversation is a follow up to the 2011 spiritual biography (also four parts) Michael hosted with Orland. And read a news article about the Sacred Hospitality of Orland Bishop on the Commonweal news pages.

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

Join Host Michael Lerner for another series of spiritual biography conversations with social activist and community leader Orland Bishop. Together, they look at his life and work, working from his book, The Seventh Shrine: Meditations on the African Spiritual Journey from the Middle Passage to the Mountaintop. This four-part conversation is a follow up to the 2011 spiritual biography (also four parts) Michael hosted with Orland. And read a news article about the Sacred Hospitality of Orland Bishop on the Commonweal news pages.

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

Join Host Michael Lerner for another series of spiritual biography conversations with social activist and community leader Orland Bishop. Together, they look at his life and work, working from his book, The Seventh Shrine: Meditations on the African Spiritual Journey from the Middle Passage to the Mountaintop. This four-part conversation is a follow up to the 2011 spiritual biography (also four parts) Michael hosted with Orland. And read a news article about the Sacred Hospitality of Orland Bishop on the Commonweal news pages.

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.