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Dyeing Arts Books

Looking for Truth
Meditations on the Gospels by Joy Troyer
 

 
ISBN 978-0-9817244-1-6 
$10.00 retail

Joy did not write this from a love of the scriptures.  In fact, it was quite the opposite.  Her experience with the misuse of the Bible had kept her away for many years.  Now she reexamines these texts from a new perspective.  Instead of looking for answers, she looks for truth.  Joy is a Unitarian Universalist who attends Orthodox Christian services with her husband. 

 

In our congregation at St. Nicholas, at the beginning of Great Lent, we celebrate Forgiveness Sunday.  Each congregant faces each other congregant one at a time.  Each says, “Forgive me.”  And each responds with “God forgives.”  It is a really amazing experience.  Though we ask each person present for forgiveness, no one has to admit to a failing and no one has to say “I forgive you.”  But I face each person, wondering whether or not I’ve offended them; wondering how much forgiveness I need.  And the answer comes back the same each time.  God forgives.

 

I don’t know who or what God is or how God’s forgiveness works.  But I believe that we have the ability to recover from our mistakes, even those that other people fail to forgive, even those of others that I have not forgiven.  I think that we need to believe that there is forgiveness, somewhere in the universe.  Forgiveness from God that comes as a part of nature, even when we don’t know we need it.  Forgiveness that opens our eyes to the needs around us, encourages us to forgive others, heals our own wounds and allows us to grow, if only we will accept it.

                                                                                       -- Excerpt from "God Forgives" meditation

 

Read an entire meditation from the book.


Walking Toward Morning
This wonderful book of meditations by Unitarian Universalist minister, Victoria Safford, was originally published by Skinner House. Dyeing Arts is republishing it so that it can continue its ministry.
 
In a cemetery once, an old one in New England, I found a strangely soothing epitaph. The name of the deceased and her dates had been scoured away by wind and rain, but there was a carving of a tree with roots and branches (a classic nineteenth-century motif) and among them the words, "She attended well and faithfully to a few worthy things." At first this seemed to me a little meager, a little stingy on the part of her survivors, but I wrote it down and have thought about it since, and now I can't imagine a more proud or satisfying legacy. Every day I stand in danger of being struck by lightning and having the obituary in the local paper say, for all the world to see, "She attended frantically and ineffectually to a great many unimportant, meaningless details."

How do you want your obituary to read?

- from "Set in Stone"

"Walking Toward Morning affirms my sense of being present to life. Victoria Safford writes with great joy and attentiveness. These meditations are simply wonderful. I will return to them again and again."

- Rev. Keith Kron

VICTORIA SAFFORD is currently serving as minister of White Bear Unitarian Universalist Church in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She holds a degree from Yale Divinity School.

You can purchase Dyeing Arts Books from Amazon.com

Or send a check for $12 per book to:
Dyeing Arts
231 McAllister Ave.
Kentfield, CA 94904

Price includes standard shipping within the US and any applicable taxes. For more information or retail discounts, contact Joy.

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