Weavings

And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness till the day of his manifestation to Israel. Luke 1:80, RSV Elizabeth nestles her infant son John, peering at his face in flickering candlelight—this future holy prophet who nevertheless awakens her in the dark hours with his hunger for her milk, his need to grow, his intent... Keep Reading →

Many years ago, on a cold December night, I stood on a sidewalk in Kingston outside the Grand Theatre waiting for my date. He was late. It was the last night of term before Christmas vacation. “Cathy!” My brother James called to me from across Princess Street. “What’re you doing? There’s a bunch of us going to Coppers.” “Can’t,” I answered, as he crossed... Keep Reading →

“Love, and do what you want,” Augustine wrote in the early 400s. But what does it mean to love truly? We are captivated by love stories, whether they tell of romance or friendship, whether they are truth or fiction. We wonder at the power of friendship and love to move and shape us. We talk about it, dream about it, pray over it,... Keep Reading →

I read Michael Downey’s piece “On Learning How to Look” (Weavings XXVI/4, Aug/Sep/Oct 2011, “The Art of Loving”) with great delight. It’s only in our willingness to look past stereotypes and categories to the real person behind, to reach out to the ‘Other’ and hence to God in the ‘face-to-face’ approach advocated by Downey (and philosopher Emmanuel Levinas), that we can open our... Keep Reading →