Returning to My Roots
Today, I celebrate the birthday of a child I once knew, now a young woman. I gave her the gift of a rosary to mark this occasion. This particular rosary contains a relic from the Chapelle of the Miraculous Medal in Paris, where Mary appeared to St Catherine Laboure and asked that a medal of her image be struck. In this year of many changes, but really, in the year or so prior to this one - I found myself drifting back to spiritual practices that had nourished me in my youth and young adulthood - such as the saying of rosaries, novenas, and so forth... While in the last several decades I immersed myself in the study of Buddhism, Hinduism and Tantra, and Judaism in the decade before that - I never veered too far from what a dear friend once referred to as my "default setting." As a theologian and educator for nearly twenty-five years, I was blessed with the opportunity to teach comparative religions - a subject near and dear to my heart. When in Rome - I do as the Romans ...