The thousandfold voices of the natural world become inaudible to many humans. The mountains, rivers, wind, and sea all became mute insofar as humans were concerned. The forests were no longer the abode of an infinite number of spirit presences but were simply so many board feet of timber to be "harvested" as objects used for human benefit. Animals were no longer the companions of humans within the single community of existence. They were denied not only their inherent dignity but even their right to habitat.
As we recover our awareness of the universe as a communion of subjects, a new interior experience awakens within the human. The barriers disappear. An enlargement of soul takes place. The excitement evoked by natural phenomena is renewed. Dawn and sunset are once again transforming experiences, as are the sights, sounds, scents, tastes, and feel of the natural world about us — the surging sea, the sound of the wind, the brooding forests. All this could be continued in a never-ending list of experiences that have been lost to large segments of the human community in recent centuries — not because the phenomena do not surround us constantly, but because we have become locked into ourselves, as though large segments of the human mind have become paralyzed. It is no wonder that humans have devastated the planet so extensively. It was only a collection of objects to be used.
Associated with this attitude is the loss of realization that the planet Earth is a onetime endowment. Earth came into being at a moment that will never occur again.
— Thomas Berry, Evening Thoughts