{"id":2559,"date":"2007-08-24T00:30:40","date_gmt":"2007-08-24T00:30:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jesuscreed\/2007\/08\/friday-is-for-friends-54.html"},"modified":"2007-08-24T00:30:40","modified_gmt":"2007-08-24T00:30:40","slug":"friday-is-for-friends-54","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2007\/08\/friday-is-for-friends-54.html","title":{"rendered":"Friday is for Friends"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Today we begin a conversation about Tracy Balzer&#8217;s book, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/redirect.html?ie=UTF8&amp;location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FThin-Places-Evangelical-Journey-Christianity%2Fdp%2F0891125132%3Fie%3DUTF8%26s%3Dbooks%26qid%3D1187898203%26sr%3D1-1&amp;tag=jescre-20&amp;linkCode=ur2&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325\">Thin Places<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=jescre-20&amp;l=ur2&amp;o=1\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" style=\"border:none !important;margin:0px !important\" \/>. It is an invitation to Celtic spirituality. I hope you join us. <!--more|inline--><br \/>\nAn opening question: What have you learned from the Celtic way?<br \/>\nTracy begins with a succinct survey of her spiritual autobiography and provides an example of how God has spoken to her &#8212; in prayer and worship, sacrament, Word, fellowship, intellect, friendship, silence and the Celtic way.<br \/>\nEach chapter has a journal entry, a discussion of a topic, a Celtic Blessing (always worth it to read these), a meditation text and some discussion questions. (Thus, this book is great for a group.)<br \/>\nThe focus of today is on &#8220;thin places.&#8221; The pagan Celts believed that certain places were sacred and loaded with religious significance. As the Celtic regions became infused with Christians, especially after St. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/redirect.html?ie=UTF8&amp;location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FSt-Patrick-Ireland-Philip-Freeman%2Fdp%2F0743256344%3Fie%3DUTF8%26s%3Dbooks%26qid%3D1187898477%26sr%3D1-3&amp;tag=jescre-20&amp;linkCode=ur2&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325\">Patrick<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=jescre-20&amp;l=ur2&amp;o=1\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" style=\"border:none !important;margin:0px !important\" \/>, those sacred places were Christianized. They became what is called &#8220;thin places.&#8221;<br \/>\nWhat is a thin place? &#8220;Any place that creates a space and an atmosphere that inspires us to be honest before God and to listen to the deep murmurings of his Spirit within us is thin&#8221; (298).<br \/>\nWe don&#8217;t have to go to Iona or to Glendalough or to Monasterboice or Saul &#8212; anyone been to these places? We don&#8217;t have enter a church or find a retreat center or go to the woods or alongside a beach &#8212; thin places are anywhere that is conducive for us to listen to and hear from God. But many of us know some thin places &#8212; and many of us have experienced thin places in a place like Iona.<br \/>\n&#8220;What makes a place truly thin? Before all else, the answer lies in our own internal landscape&#8221; (38). I like this expression: &#8220;our own internal landscape.&#8221;<br \/>\nA major issue for most of us is that we find ourselves often in &#8220;thick places.&#8221; That is, where God seems absent or distant or we seem especially unreceptive. We need some discipline and we need to wait on God.<br \/>\nTwo of Tracy&#8217;s questions: What is the thinnest place you&#8217;ve been to? What are the things that make your world &#8220;thick&#8221;?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today we begin a conversation about Tracy Balzer&#8217;s book, Thin Places. It is an invitation to Celtic spirituality. I hope you join us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":298,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-prayer-and-formation"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Friday is for Friends - Jesus Creed<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2007\/08\/friday-is-for-friends-54.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Friday is for Friends - Jesus Creed\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Today we begin a conversation about Tracy Balzer&#8217;s book, Thin Places. It is an invitation to Celtic spirituality. I hope you join us.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2007\/08\/friday-is-for-friends-54.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Jesus Creed\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2007-08-24T00:30:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=jescre-20&amp;l=ur2&amp;o=1\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"xscot mcknight\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Friday is for Friends - Jesus Creed","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2007\/08\/friday-is-for-friends-54.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Friday is for Friends - Jesus Creed","og_description":"Today we begin a conversation about Tracy Balzer&#8217;s book, Thin Places. 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