What a pleasure it was, then, to pick up [Barbara Brown] Taylor’s exciting book. It is aptly subtitled; for indeed she tells, in a homely and forthright way, of discovering the sacred beneath our feet ”” sometimes literally. Hers is a most down-to-earth book, bursting with life, offering imaginaÂtive and exciting advice, with no hint of a “holier-than-thou” attiÂtude.
Each chapter starts from incidents and anecdotes ”” some hilarious ”” in her life as a divinity teacher, wife, pastor, and friend. They are the kinds of experiences, good and bad, happy and sorrowful, any of us might have had or have. But she has the holiness (my word) to see beÂneath and behind them.
While she is clearly well-trained in spirituality at an academic level, that is not her source here ”” just her tool for interpreting and extraÂpolating from day to day events: finding a job, making eye contact with a check-out girl, getting lost in a wood.