Birthing God: Women's Experience of the Divine [Paperback]

Powerful narratives of suffering, love and hope that inspire both personal and collective transformation.

Our spiritual stories are full of missteps and unabashed celebration. They are narratives of suffering and of hope; lessons in shedding fear and learning to love ourselves. Ours are embodied stories that begin with emptying so that we can glimpse the Holy Other, this Light who appears in ways unplanned, unexpected and unsettling. Our lives are the surprise that begins with the response, 'Let it be.'
from Part 1

InBirthing God, forty women relate Spirit-filled moments: a grieving pastor walks a labyrinth and rediscovers the Rock of her existence; a human rights advocate re-encounters Allah in an intensely visceral moment in the sun; an educator, moved by an ancestral vision, launches a global tree-planting project to heal the wounds of slavery; a revolutionary awakens from a coma and realizes that all of life is infused with Spirit; a peasant woman under fire discovers within herself the God who gives her courage; and a disabled doctor, embraced by Shekhinah, turns her heart to rabbinical studies.

Grounded in raw experience and ideal for spiritual seekers and leaders of all faiths, these engaging and powerful stories invite you to consider the origins of your own spirituality and to deepen your relationship with God.

An excellent study of women's personal experiences across various faiths.... Will appeal to readers with an interest in women's spirituality, feminist spirituality, ecofeminism.... A good choice for reading groups.

Foreword ix

Part I
Divine Love and Love of Self1
Esperanza: Great Courage within Me 9
Lindsey: Where We Find God 16
Lori: Rocking in the Mother's Arms 21
Hyun Kyung: From the Palms of God into the Vortex of Becoming 26
Susan: Worthy to Stand Here with Glól