Tomorrow at 4:00 PM I fly out of Melbourne to Singapore, and then on to London for two days, then finally to Assisi for a three week conference on St. Francis. Hopefully I will be learning much and teaching a little, mainly on Thomas Merton and some connections between Francis and the best of the Benedictine tradition.
If I were a better ascetic I would not take the iBook, not have checked out internet cafes in Assisi, not planned to keep in touch with the world around the campus while across the world, but I am not. A trip like this is too good not to be shared!
I was in Assisi two years ago for a week and it was wonderful. I am suspicious when people talk about places that are “holy,” but Assisi is a special place by any definition: I walked into the little church that Francis rebuilt, and where Clare died, knelt to pray, and thanksgiving exploded out of me like fireworks. That holy place enabled me to see again how many places are holy. I am looking forward to this trip.
1 comment:
Hi Bob!
Hello from Brian Hook, your old pal from San Francisco in the mid-90s. I can't believe you live in Melbourne, Australia! It has been 7 years since I saw you last in SF.
How are you?
How is God's great plan did you get all the way to Melbourne of all places? It is on the top of my list of places I want to visit.
I just started to reread Thomas Merton: Spiritual Master again and was wondering what happened to you. I bumped into Cameron Eng about 5-6 years ago and he said you were living in Berkeley.
When you get back from your trip email me. You don't have an email address listed on this Blog site so I hope you read this comment.
I can be reached at bhook@earthlink.net
Hope to hear from you soon! We can exchange our life journeys at that time.
Brian
PS Peter Beil says "Hello"!
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