Saint Jane Addams

What object from your childhood did you consider Holy? I was recently asked this question at a workshop on writing spiritual memoir, and quickly an image came to mind.

When I grew up we had the Childcraft set of encyclopedias, white books with red leather at the bottom, a drawing, and a volume number. Volume one, nursery rhymes, was the one we read the most, but I also explored the stories of famous people, especially Jane Addams and her settlement house in Chicago.

Perhaps because I considered this text holy, I read it sitting in the dark and quiet hallway next to the bookcase. I’d find the pictures of Jane and read about the life of this wealthy woman who chose to live among the poor. She opened her home to children and mothers, held neighborhood meetings, and created change because it was needed.

Why was that book holy to me? Because we were raised to take care our things, I treated the book itself with care.  But it was the story that transported me to another state of being, which is the function of holy relics and rituals.  I glimpsed what humans are capable of--kindness, generosity, self-sacrifice, authentic community--and I yearned for that myself.

I wonder if what we consider holy as children comes from our truest desires, if we instinctively know who the saints in our lives are—whether in person or in books. Perhaps I knew that the day care I'd attended, Unity House, was an historic settlement house in north Minneapolis and felt a connection.

Or perhaps we’re called to our best selves all along the way, a golden thread that, if we listen and take hold, allows us to step into the best life we can lead, the one that makes us both happy and useful.