“One Among and not Separate From”: Fallen Communion and Forfeit Community in Cormac McCarthy’s The Crossing

Set in motion by Billy Parham’s decision to repatriate a Mexican wolf, The Crossing is defined by his bond with nature. But despite his commitment to conservation, Billy’s efforts lead to the death of all he loves. This tragic end constitutes a Christian warning against turning environmental stewardship into an idolatry that usurps the duty to love. Billy seeks, through the wolf, a harmony with Creation, and critics have deemed this yearning laudable. Yet his stewardship is presented as deformed by a denial of original sin. Billy seeks a self-authored return to Eden, but thinking he can ignore his own fallenness, he only reenacts the Fall. Consistently an object of others’ charity, he repeatedly shatters community in his quest to commune with Creation. Thus his longing for oneness with nature works to divorce him from the charitable and constraining communion with God and man that must undergird any proper stewardship.