The deepest cause of the present devastation is found in a mode of consciousness that has established a radical discontinuity between the human and other modes of being and the bestowal of all rights on the humans. They have reality and value only through their use by the human. All four are committed consciously or unconsciously to a radical discontinuity between the human and the non-human. In this community each being has its own role to fulfil, its own dignity, its inner spontaneity. Every being has its own voice.
Every being declares itself to the entire universe.
Every being enters into communion with other beings. This capacity for relatedness, for presence to other beings, for spontaneity in action, is a capacity possessed by every mode of being throughout the entire universe. Today, humanity is challenged to discover or rediscover this single integrated community of life on Earth in terms of ideas, images, myths, rituals, and practices that are meaningful to people today. Berry, who has written on the religions of India and on Buddhism and Chinese culture, is well aware that in earlier times, there have been teachings which stressed the kinship of all life. In The Great Work with an American audience in mind, he quotes many examples from the Native Americans who had a strong sense of living within Nature, a sense of place and the need for sympathy toward animal and plant life.