Voices and Echoes: Canadian Women’s Spirituality

Jo-Anne Elder, Colin O’Connell, Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion

Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press, Oct 15, 1997 - Literary Criticism - 237 pages

“Every time we raise our voices, we hear echoes.” Jo-Anne Elder, from the Foreword

Through short stories, journal entries and poetry, the women in Voices and Echoes explore the changing landscape of their spiritual lives. Experienced writers such as Lorna Crozier, Di Brandt and Ann Copeland, as well as strong new voices, appear to speak to each other as they draw from a wealth of personal resources to find a way to face life’s questions and discover meaning in their lives.

There is something familiar about these stories and poems — they echo those we’ve heard before and those we’ve half forgotten. Whether they search for a voice in a world where men monopolize or journey into painful memories to free the self from the past, they do not despair, they do not end. Individual entries become the whole story — an unending story of rebirth and reaffirmation.

The book begins with an illuminating foreword that introduces readers to the cultural and philosophical background of many of the stories, and concludes with the reflections of scholars, writers and artists that are intended to provoke further discussion.

Contents

• Visions and Echoes: 1
• Angelus or Blessed Are the Uninitiated for They Shall Go Fishing: 11
• already there is no going back: 19
• The Day I Sat with Jesus on the Sun Deck and a Wind Came Up and Blew My Kimono Open and He Saw My Breasts: 21
• Discriminatio Spirituum: 33
• the challenge: 39
• the wall: 41
• scenting You: 43
• hallel: 45
• breaking the rules: 47
• Margarets Dreams: 49
• The Death of a Husband: 57
• Disturbing the Peace: 61
• The Stations of the Cross: 67
• This Is History: 77
• Journey into the Vortex: 83
• Myths: 91
• Between Ebony and Ivory: 93
• Last Picnic: 97
• Second Solitude: 99
• Parallel Images: 109
• Beginning in Summer: 111
• Mother is Sewing: 119
• Blood and Chestnuts: 121
• Gifts: 125
• The Birth Circle: 129
• The Weaned Child: 135
• Meditation on Night Number One: 137
• What She Remembered and What She Forgot: 149
• Erics Song: 159
• Thee: 161
• Black Moon: 165
• A Day in the Life of a Warrior or Safe in the Body of Goddess: 171
• Echoes: 183
• List of Contributors: 219
• Source Notes: 227
• Selected Bibliography: 229

Popular passages

Page xiii - Properly speaking, it is impossible in the absence of a diversity of voices: in it different universes of discourse meet, acknowledge each other and enjoy an oblique relationship which neither requires nor forecasts their being assimilated to one another.‎

Bibliographic information

• Title: Voices and Echoes: Canadian Women’s Spirituality; Issue 4 of Etudes sur les femmes et la religion; Volume 4 of Studies in Women and Religion; Wilfrid Laurier Series
• Authors: Jo-Anne Elder, Colin O’Connell, Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion
• Editors: Jo-Anne Elder, Colin O’Connell
• Publisher: Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press, 1997
• ISBN: 0889202869, 9780889202863
• Length: 237 pages
• Subjects: Literary Criticism / American / General; Literary Criticism / Women Authors; Religion / Christian Theology / General; Religion / Christianity / General; Religion / General; Religion / Sexuality & Gender Studies; Religion / Spirituality; Social Science / Feminism & Feminist Theory; Social Science / Women's Studies