Churches in “company towns” can find it difficult to talk about environmental impacts on health. Jobs and real estate values are at stake. Can the theological lens of watershed discipleship help churches host difficult conversations about environmental links to community health challenges? I propose to explore this question with particular reference to industrial nuclear or naturally-occurring uranium contamination in two bio-regions: those of the Great Lakes, where I practice ministry, and of the central Columbia River, my ancestral home.

Citizens are initiating community-based health studies in the Lake Huron nuclearized zone and in the uranium-rich mountains of Castlegar, B.C. We are concerned about the health effects of cumulative doses of low-level radiation, be they from tritium spikes in the routine emissions from the Bruce nuclear reactors at Lake Huron, or from the breakdown of uranium into radon in B.C. wells and garden soil. I hope to facilitate community dialogue and learning with the theological lens of watershed discipleship. I will write, speak, and articulate a holistic pastoral and prophetic response to high rates of cancers and other illnesses in these bio-regions.