Pilgrim in America

I asked Pat to take me to a Vancouver worship service. This is going to be a Buddhist one. We introduce ourselves. Patrick leads the choir. Topic of the service: the sound. How the sound of your voice speaks about your mood, your state of mind, and your character.

I compare the humanistic lectures with the worship service, note the symbolic elements, meditate on the ambivalence of using them: connecting and separating. Note the parallel of Francis David's dealing with the problem of using symbols. Patrick also gave a lecture on singing. We learned a sing-along with the choir. I note an interesting custom: rubbing hands together instead of clapping. Meditation: think of a beloved one, call out his/her name aloud... think of the humankind.

On our way back Pat showed me the college where she used to work 17 years as a councellor for the students. She was picked out for this new job from 350 people. Her specialty: women's rights. In a time when this used to be a difficult issue. She was recognized as the mother of the women's rights movement, they organize meetings each year, several thousand attending on these occasions. After she retired she missed the community, this is how she found the First UU in Portland.