13 Sacred Places

A few weeks ago, I heard a portion of a homily that really hit home with me. It was hard to listen - a different church, a different priest, Jake had a million questions, a bad time of day. So I missed a lot of the homily. But one thing that I did hear has been percolating around in the recesses of my brain since then. The priest defined "sacred place" as "a place where we meet God." So I've been thinking of all the places besides churches (because, well, of course I'd expect to find God there) that I've met Him in one form or another. Places and times that I felt as if I were intended to be there at that moment. And since we don't mark such places with shrines anymore, I'm marking some of them here. There are no burning bushes, but they are holy to me nonetheless.

1. A hospital
2. Door County, Wisconsin
3. Nehalem Spit, Oregon
4. A hiking trail in Pere Marquette Park, Illinois
5. The Lime Kiln Trail
6. A river in the Black Forest, Germany
7. The quad at Truman University (although it was NMSU at the time), walking with a friend
8. A breakfast table
9. Duck Lake, Michigan
10. Misery Bay, Michigan
11. Epiphany Fields (hey - it's not technically a church!)
12. The patio of a nursing home
13. The redwoods (how could I NOT?)

Reading over my list, most of these are place where I've been once, twice, three times and had seminal moments. I think maybe the challenge is to find (or bring) the sacred into the mundane.