Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Writing and Faith...

Every now and then, you read something that really stretches your mind and makes you think about a topic in totally fresh and unique way. Cheryl Klein, an editor at Arthur A. Levine Books (a Scholastic imprint), has done this with a thought provoking article on her website titled On Writing and Faith. I had never really even thought about the connection between the two until I read her article (which she gave as a talk at her church in Brooklyn). The comparisons she draws are very interesting. Even though I don't agree completely with everything she says, as a "writer of faith" myself, I can definitely appreciate where she's coming from. Here's an excerpt I found particularly poignant; I hope you'll go to Cheryl's website to read the rest:

This actually isn't such a random comparison to draw because language and faith are intimately connected in the Christian church: We don’t dance to feel the spirit, and we rarely meditate to make it come. Instead we live in words: studying the Bible, singing the lyrics, and praying—in silence or out loud, but in language. Of course we hope with all these things to get beyond words; but language remains our primary method of approaching God, and often the only way we communicate our experience.

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