​​Trees Can Save the World
and We Can Help Them
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​"In all of my years of reading environmental literature, I have never encountered writing as compelling and comprehensive, yet clear, accessible, and uplifting as Basil Camu’s From Wasteland to Wonder. Basil’s logic will overwhelm any lingering doubts you may have about this approach to landscaping and provide that kick in the pants so many of us need to take action."

— Doug Tallamy, Ecologist and Author of Nature’s Best Hope

The title of this short note--“Trees Can Save the World and We Can Help Them”—is a variation on Basil Camu’s talk “How Trees Can Save the World and What We Can Do to Help Them,” summarized below and offered in full as a video at the bottom of this page. You will also find a book he has written, offered free to the general public: From Wasteland to Wonder.

A Shared Vision of Healing

As a process theologian, I am deeply grateful to him for presenting such a compelling vision of something essential to us all: how we might participate in building ecological civilizations. Camu is not a theologian, though he is influenced by the spiritual teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh in Zen and the Art of Saving the Planet and The Universe Story as told by Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme, as am I. Yet his message harmonizes beautifully with process theology.

The Salvific Power of Trees

The salvific power of trees is a little like the salvific power of God—it requires cooperation to be effective. With our help, trees can indeed help save the world. They sequester carbon, rebuild soil, renew water cycles, offer shade and shelter for birds, and restore the balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. They knit together fractured ecosystems and provide homes for the countless creatures who share this planet with us. But they need our partnership to do this sacred work.

The Spirit That Calls Us to Cooperate

And so it goes with the Spirit of God, too. This Spirit dwells within each of us—and within each creature—as an indwelling lure toward satisfaction and flourishing relative to each moment’s possibilities. For human beings, this same Spirit calls us to help the whole of life thrive: other humans, other species, and the Earth itself. Yet this divine lure is not all-powerful. It requires our cooperation—our cooperation with its quiet beckoning and with the living systems around us. The Spirit needs us to cooperate with trees.

Caring for the Body of God

There is, then, a sense in which our care for the Earth can help “save” God as well. If we imagine the universe as the living body of God—a sacred, breathing presence in which every creature participates—then to care for the Earth is to tend God’s own body. The rivers are God’s veins, the forests God’s lungs, the soil God’s skin, and the atmosphere God’s breath. When we clear forests, poison waters, and strip the land, we wound this living body. When we restore the land, we help it heal.

The World in Pain, the Call to Heal

Today, that body is in pain. We are denuding life by destroying forests and grasslands, turning soil back into dirt, drying streams and wetlands, and releasing immense quantities of carbon into the air. The harm is planetary, yet the call to healing is intimate and near.

From Wasteland to Wonder

One of the simplest and most life-giving acts we can take, explains Basil Camu, is to plant a tree in our own backyard, if we live in an urban or suburban setting.

In his talk From Wasteland to Wonder, Camu explains how living landscapes function as interdependent systems in which life, minerals, and water continuously shape one another. Soil forms when organisms mix with minerals to create a sponge that holds water and nurtures roots; trees capture carbon, generate oxygen, and even influence rainfall. Modern human practices—clearing forests, maintaining chemical-laden lawns, and fragmenting habitats—disrupt these cycles, causing soil erosion, biodiversity loss, and climate instability.

To restore balance

Camu proposes working with rather than against natural processes. He encourages planting native saplings (or growing them yourself), preserving mature trees, and pruning young ones for healthy structure. Soil should be fed naturally through decomposing leaves, arborist wood chips, and compost—without fertilizers or pesticides. Lawns can be transformed into low-maintenance native meadows; dense “pocket forests” and mixed native thickets can replace sterile hedges to support wildlife. By keeping brush piles, reducing light pollution, and removing invasive plants, homeowners can help heal ecosystems in their own yards—saving money and time while restoring the Earth’s vitality.

A Gesture of Faith

There is hope here. A tree is both a plant and a gesture of faith in the resilience of life. Trees can help save the world, if we help them.

About Basil Camu

Basil Camu is a North Carolina–based arborist, ecologist, and author who reimagines how people care for trees and landscapes in urban and suburban settings. A Duke University graduate and ISA Board Certified Master Arborist, he co-founded Leaf & Limb, a tree-care company that shifted its focus from removals to ecological restoration, and he leads Project Pando, a nonprofit that propagates and gives away native trees to communities. Calling himself a “treecologist,” Camu promotes soil health, long-term tree care, and coexistence with nature—encouraging people to leave leaves, value dead trees as habitat, and think of their yards as living ecosystems. His book From Wasteland to Wonder distills this philosophy, inviting homeowners to help heal the Earth one landscape at a time.

​From Wasteland to Wonder
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“From Wasteland to Wonder” by Basil Camu can be downloaded for free at leaflimb.com/wonder. You can watch a  video on it as well: see above.
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How Trees Can Save the World 
And What We Can Do to Help

Interview with Basil Camu