A Canadian on Dutch soil: research fellow Sarah K. Johnson
Soil matters. That was the experience of Canadian Dr Sarah Kathleen Johnson, who spent two months at the PThU in May and June 2026 as a research fellow with the Soil project. "It has been a privilege to spend two months taking soil as a starting point for doing theology."
Visit to the Netherlands
Dr Johnson experienced how her perspective on conversations about soil in the Netherlands was influenced by what she saw during her travels through the country. Her visit was a good example of how we practise theology in our research.
Sarah Johnson is Associate Professor of Liturgical Studies at Saint Paul University in Ottawa, Canada. She was a guest of the Grond project because of her involvement in the ecumenical process surrounding the new Feast of Creation, which is currently finding a place in the liturgical calendar. Because of her research interests in disaster rituals, she also sought connections with the Institute for Ritual and Liturgical Studies, which has a long research tradition in this field.
Feast of Creation
'It has been a privilege to spend two months taking soil as a starting point for doing theology,' she says. 'It has been particularly valuable to do so on Dutch soil that is very different from the land that I call home in Canada. Being in an unfamiliar geographic and theological context challenges assumptions and opens up new avenues of thought and action.
Both soil broadly and the connection with this particular Dutch soil have fuelled substantial work on Grounded Liturgy: Earth, Land, Soil, and Christian Worship Practices, the volume I am coediting with Mirella Klomp. I am particularly grateful for the insights of the SOIL Project team on the chapter that I wrote during my time here, "Temporality, Spatiality, and the Feast of Creation: Exploring Unintended Consequences of Ritual Responses to Crisis.”
I was fortunate to co-lead a time of morning prayer and a workshop with Carl Bear for a continuing education event on the theme of “Singing with All Creation.” We developed the workshop together here. I also adapted it to serve as a chapter in a book that I am coauthoring, Singing Justice: Congregational Song as a Practice of Peace (Abingdon), three other chapters of which I also wrote over the past two months.
In addition to publications and presentations related to the SOIL Project, I participated in the expertmeeting, a workshop and liturgy facilitated by Mariken Heitman, and a visit to the Jesse Darling’s Godsworth contemporary art installation at Oude Kerk in Amsterdam. Independently, I spent a couple of days in Friesland exploring connections between soil and Mennonites, my tradition of origin and ordination.
Beyond publications and presentations directly related to the SOIL Project, I was grateful for the opportunity to engage the Practical Theology Chair group in conversation in work in progress on ritual responses to gun violence that is part of my larger Crisis and Culture project. I also attended lectures given by André Mulder and Henk de Roest.
I wish to express my gratitude to all of the members of the PThU community who took the time to meet with me individually to share about their research and offer insights into my various ongoing projects, as well as those who shared in more informal conversations over lunch or around events.'
(Image: Sarah Kathleen Johnson: View of polders on the bicycle ride from Tienhoven to the PThU)
