| Available Online From These Trusted Retailers | |
 |
 |
Behind the Book
Bolt from the Black
I never decided to write Original Faith. It didn't begin as a concept that I looked at with regard to market potential. It didn't come from a notion that I wanted to write or become a spiritual teacher.
Original Faith began as a bolt from the black. In an attic on a dark night in June, I was struck by an experience unlike any I had ever known. It released me literally overnight from a despair I believe would have led me to end my life before reaching the age of thirty.
Now, twenty five years later, Original Faith is the work of a lifetime. Its words are words that found me out and shaped me to their purpose. It is less that I wrote them and more like I only let them in, helping them along their way, by years of getting up at 2 or 3 A.M. to meditate; sitting at my writing table to find out what would happen; and go jogging at dawn. That was my night life. By day I worked with young children for twenty three years, first as a teacher and then as a school counselor. While the kids may have learned a little from me, I learned a lot from them.
Process
It became one process. Words rooted in the utter wordlessness of a night in June came to me slowly; I was shaped by them in turn; lived by them; and more words came to me.
I came to see that even my early despair was part of the process. Back then, I had asked myself what I could and couldn't believe. After that June night, the process took off and flourished on its own as I began learning who I am and who I am still becoming. We can outgrow the questions we once posed. We can be ourselves, simply.
Then we know love, faith, and purpose. Then we experience concern with the wider world and the coming generations from out of the person of our own persons. Then we live and act from out of a faith-full love not because we desire a heavenly reward or fear eternal punishment, but because we know who we are from the depths of our own sincerity — a depth that touches on something infinitely greater than ourselves alone.
Texture
Original Faith is short yet multidimensional. The language is often highly literary to move readers at the level of feeling and experience. Without becoming abstract or complex, the text goes on to conceptualize these feelings and experiences, making sense of them. After feeling and insight comes the necessary work of spiritual practice, and Original Faith has much to offer in this regard.
That the book was such an immense pleasure to write is reflected in its presentations of home, place, and natural beauty: you may get a feel for living in northern New England even if you've never been there. The book also has a non-evangelical Christian dimension: while you'll find few quotes from scripture and no endorsement or rejection of any belief system, my religious heritage happens to be Christian.
People familiar with the bible will notice that certain phrases play off or resonate with biblical language. People unfamiliar with the bible will not mind this, even if they notice. I have used the language of my tradition for its power of inclusion, not for judgment and exclusivity.
Finally, in places where it helps to tell the larger story, the book tells a little of my own story. The peace and joy brought by a faith original to who we are can become a source of unsuspected vitality and strength even under extraordinary adversity.
Learn More About Original Faith
- From the Publisher — Summary of the book
- See what people are saying about Original Faith
- Excerpts — Table of contents and excerpts from Original Faith
Buy Your Copy Today
Original Faith is available online at Amazon.com and Target.com and is also available soon by special order at your favorite bookstore (ISBN: 978-1-934611-00-5).| Available Online From These Trusted Retailers | |
|
|
