Standing in Holy Places

I'm holed up right now in a hotel room in Donegal, PA.  The temperature is quickly dropping below zero, and we're snowed in completely.  The boys and Jenn are playing United States Bingo, and I'm reminiscing about where I was just about a year ago: stuck in London while Jenn and the boys were snowed in during Winter Storm Nemo.  When Nemo hit, it dropped nearly 3 feet of snow in a day and closed down Logan Airport completely.  I suddenly had some extra time in London (not a bad place to be stuck!) while Jenn couldn't get out of the house with 3 boys to take care of (a much worse place to be stuck).

With my new-found leisure time, I jumped on the tube and headed to St. Paul's Cathedral, a place that Jenn and I hadn't made it to when we visited London in 2010.  I happened to get there at 4:00pm, just 45 minutes before it closed.  I did a quick version of the audio tour, and when I was turning in my player they mentioned to me that I was welcome to stay for Evensong, a 45 minute long worship service in which a men's and boy's choir sings verses from Psalms.  I didn't have anywhere else to go, so I decided to stick around.  I ended up being one of the first people seated and was placed in the Quire, which are those fancy wooden seats that are intricately carved:

The next 45 minutes were, in a word, divine.  I was in the middle of a very stressful job search, and it was just amazing to sit in a place where men and women had dedicated thousands of hours to building an edifice to the Lord.  Each chanted verse of the Bible seemed to strip off a layer of worry and stress, and replace it with peace during this beautiful and simple service.  Afterwards, I stepped out, admired the magnificent dome, took a deep breath, and then re-entered the world feeling much more focused on what really mattered to me.  Despite differences of belief, I had found a new holy place for me.

Fast forward six months, and once again I found myself on another continent with a few hours to spare.  This time I was in Tokyo presenting a paper.  After the conference was over, I had a few hours before my plane left so I braved the subway system (which was surprisingly easy to navigate, actually), and made my way to the Meiji Shrine, in downtown Tokyo.  I know pretty much nothing about Shinto spirituality, but I couldn't help but feel connected to the idea of wanting to cleanse yourself before entering a sacred place, as you are asked to do before entering the center of the Meiji Shrine:

I also really loved this tree in the middle of the shrine, where visitors are allowed to hang prayers written on small plaques.

Most of the plaques were in Japanese, but I feel pretty confident that I would agree with what was written on nearly all of them.  I loved the few hours I had to wander the grounds of the shrine, nestled in the middle of one of the largest cities in the world.  Again, I was struck by how close to God I felt, despite the huge differences between my beliefs and Shinto spiritualism.

And finally, a few weeks after being in Tokyo, I was in Tucson visiting Dan and Autumn after going to a conference in Southern Utah.  On a Sunday afternoon, they took me to the Mission San Xavier del Bac, which looks like this on the outside:

and this on the inside:

It was blistering hot while we were there, and it was very easy to imagine the effort that must have been required to build this mission way back in the 18th century.  And once again I was very glad to find myself in a place where my fellow brothers and sisters had worked very hard to set aside a holy place where they could worship God.



In the past year, I logged over 62,555 total miles (that's equivalent to 2 1/2 times around the world!) and passed through 30 different cities.  I missed being home during those trips, because my home is a sacred place for me.  But I'm so, so glad I was able to find just a few moments to stand in new holy places, and appreciate just how strong the human race's desire is, in all times and places and cultures, to connect with God.