When we moved to the Pacific Northwest four years ago, pretty much the first thing my husband did was attend the local Unitarian Universalist church.  Actually, as soon as we nailed down where we were moving to, he contacted the church to let them know he was interested in attending.  He was very gung-ho about my attending as well, but since I have a number of unpleasant experiences from childhood relating to religion, I wasn’t very interested.

After a couple of months, though, I went with him to a few Sunday services.  Unfortunately, due to my neurospiciness, I found the bright lights, noise, and chaos of the crowd of congregants to be highly triggering, so I didn’t enjoy that.  I was, however, interested in the various affinity groups that run within the congregation, which are smaller and more manageable from a stress standpoint.  The first one we became involved with was a newly formed book study group focusing on spiritually oriented non-fiction titles, with the goal being to broaden our spiritual horizons personally as well as globally, in order to be more inclusive of others unlike us.

That was over three years ago.  In that time, our small group has varied between four to eight members, typically averaging the same six attendees.  Peggy, a former Catholic who still maintains faith in the Judeo-Christian God, began the group.  Janice resided in the UAE for 30 years, giving her a much different perspective on Islam than most Americans.  There’s myself, the Zen-Hindu-Taoist Earth-worshipper, and my husband, a former Episcopalian, who have been cherry-picking from numerous religions and spiritual traditions since the mid-to-late 80s.  Last but not least, there’s John, a Ch’an-Taoist and former English professor, and his wife Maria, a very progressive but devout Catholic, something I used to think was a contradiction in terms.  They aren’t even members of the church, they found out about the reading group by looking for local book study groups.  The age range of the group is from the mid-50s to the mid-80s.

Every month, we read a new book with some sort of spiritual, mystical, or religious focus, and then we meet to discuss it for 90 minutes.  Due to the eclectic nature of our group and our willingness to openly challenge our own beliefs when presented with a different spiritual viewpoint, we have extremely interesting conversations.  Sometimes so much so that we will decide to talk about the book for an additional month, particularly if the book is lengthy or chewy.

Our first few meetings were difficult for me from a social perspective.  My social skills aren’t that great in the first place, plus I was still in recovery mode from The Madness in 2019, as well as moving over 2200 miles earlier that year.  I was exhausted and cranky, and I’m sure it showed.  I found it difficult to get into talking about the monthly book, and I found myself irritated by the other members in a way that I knew was inappropriate.  So my early participation was spotty.

I stuck with it, though, and I’m glad I did.  The members I used to find annoying or irritating are now some of my favorite people, such as John, the Professor.  At first I thought he was a stuffy, sanctimonious know-it-all, but that was all me and my own perceptions and projections.  I have since grown very fond of him, in particular because he has been one of the very few people in my life to truly understand me and take my spiritual experiences seriously without pathologizing me.  He even wrote the most wonderful letter of recommendation for me to include in my admission paperwork to the local university.  I don’t think anyone has ever said such nice things about me.  It’s nice to have my intelligence and even wisdom, dare I say, properly acknowledged. He is also around the same age as my own father would be had he not died when I was 3, so my inner child considers him to be something of a surrogate dad.

Below is a list of the books that our little group has read since we began in September 2022.  They are grouped by type of faith tradition from the oldest to the newest.

• Finding Soul on the Path of Orisa by Tobe Melora Correal (West African religions)
• Two Old Women by Velma Wallis (First Nations of Northern West Hemisphere)
• The Upanisads, translated by Eknath Easwaran (Hinduism)
• What Makes You NOT a Buddhist by Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse (Buddhism)
• The Wonder of Presence by Toni Packer (Buddhism, meditation)
• Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu, trans. by Ursula K. LeGuin (Taoism)
• The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff (Taoism)
• Wild Mind, Wild Earth by David Hinton (Ch’an-Taoism)
• Existence: A Story by David Hinton (Ch’an-Taoism)
• Awakened Cosmos by David Hinton (Ch’an Taoism)
• The Essence of Shinto by Motohisa Yamakage (Shinto)
• Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki (Zen Buddhism)
• Peace Is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh (Zen Buddhism)
• Nothing Special by Charlotte Joko Beck (Zen Buddhism)
• Start Where You Are by Pema Chodron (Shambhala Buddhism)
• Essential Judaism by George Robinson (Judaism)
• Universal Christ by Richard Rohr (Gnostic Christianity)
• Thou Art That by Joseph Campbell (Gnostic Christian mythology)
• Islam: What Non-Muslims Should Know by John Kaltner (Islam)
• Fire in the Head by Tom Cowan (Celtic Mysticism)
• Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom by John O’Donohue (Celtic Mysticism)
• The Circle Within by Dianne Sylvan (Wicca)
• The Spell of the Sensuous by David Abram (general spirituality)
• The Enlightened Mind by Stephen Mitchell (general spirituality)
• Out of Your Mind by Alan Watts (general spirituality)
• Aging as a Spiritual Practice by Lewis Raymond (general spirituality)
• Wild Mercy by Mirabai Starr (general spirituality)
• Siddhartha by Herman Hesse (fiction)

Clearly our group cleaves to Buddhism (Ch’an/Zen, Mahayana), Taoism, various forms of gnosticism, and veneration of the Earth and the entire Cosmos as living, conscious entities.  Clearly that still leaves a lot of room for further study of other religions, though.  The world’s eight most popular religions constitute over 90% of spiritual followers, while the remaining approximate 10% hold thousands of much smaller spiritual denominations that are no less important than the Big Eight.  Below is a non-comprehensive list of faiths and traditions our group is interested in learning about in the future.

UNADDRESSED RELIGIOUS, SPIRITUAL, AND MYSTICAL TRADITIONS

• Australian Aborigines
  • Dreamtime
• Animism
  • First Nations of Western Hemisphere
  • Kemetism (Ancient Egyptian religion)
  • Hinduism 
• Indigenous Mysticism & Gnosis
  • Journeying
  • Soul retrieval
  • Soul extraction & healing
  • Spiritual dismemberment
• Folk traditions
  • Hexes and charms
  • Superstitions
  • Fairy tales
  • Oral traditions
• Neo-Paganism
  • Druidic/Celtic
  • Greco-Roman
  • Germanic
  • Norse-Scandinavian
  • Stregheria (Italian witchcraft)
  • many others
• Hermeticism
  • Thelema
  • Golden Dawn
  • Rosicrucian
  • alchemy as personal transformation
• Zoroastrianism 
• Jainism
• Sikhism
• Eastern Orthodox Christianity
• Sufism (Muslim mysticism)
• Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism)
• Baha’i

One of the cool things about this group for me personally is that it’s giving me a great excuse to suggest unread books from our own library.  We are inveterate and unapologetic book collectors, and a fair portion of the books we own have not been read.  Yet.  The following is a small list of some of our own books that would be well-received by the others in the group.

UNREAD BOOKS

• Hinduism by Kim Knott (Hinduism)
• The Wise Heart by Jack Kornfield (Buddhism)
• No Mud, No Lotus by Thich Nhat Hanh (Zen)
• The Joy of Full Consciousness by Jean Pierre and Rachel Cartier (Thich Nhat Hanh – Zen)
• Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh (Zen, Christianity)
• The End of Traditional Pagans and the Rise of Christianity by James O’Donnell (early Pagans and Christianity)
• Jesus and the Lost Goddess by Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy (Gnostic Christianity)
• The Earth Path by Starhawk (Wicca)
• The Coming of the Cosmic Christ by Matthew Fox (general spirituality)
• Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality by Matthew Fox (general spirituality)
• The World’s Great Religions by Huston Smith (general spirituality)
• The Prophet by Khalil Gibran (general spirituality)
• Transformations of Myth and the Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell, plus many other titles (mythology)
• The Blind Spot by Adam Frank (humanism)
• The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho (spiritual fiction)

It was with no small amount of happiness that I discovered, after about a year of participation, that I considered the other members to be friends, and not just monthly acquaintances.  Our discussions have necessarily delved deeply into some very personal subjects, and the central six of us who typically attend are now gently bound by familiarity and trust, two things I’m not well-versed in.  Together, we have learned a great deal about the spiritual lives of billions of people, as well as each other, and enriched our own spiritual lives in the process.  I think it’s safe to say that we’re all looking forward to our monthly talks in the future.

If you, Gentle Reader, are interested in any of these titles, I highly recommend BookFinder.  It will search the entire internet for available copies of any book, new or used, and provide a list of vendors.  If you, like me, like to be careful where your money goes, be aware that Amazon now owns companies that were once good alternatives, such as ThriftBooks and AbeBooks.  Biblio is hit or miss, as its listings show Amazon-owned listings as well as independent listings.  Half Price Books is still a safe choice, though these days, your best bet is to support your local independent bookstore if you want to make sure your money isn’t being used nefariously.