Mirabai Starr is a writer, translator, speaker and teacher.
|
Review from Publishers Weekly
God of Love: A Guide to the Heart of Judaism, Christianity and Islam
Mirabai Starr. Monkfish
$15.95 trade paper (240p) ISBN 978-0-9833589-2-3
Religion in Review - February 29, 2012
"…she writes about the three Abrahamic religions as a woman in love, not as a tenure-hungry prof."
Maybe if Starr (Dark Night of the Soul) were less of a storyteller, her style would be less invitational, but she writes about the three Abrahamic religions as a woman in love, not as a tenure-hungry prof. The result, bearing the brilliance of her surname, plaits a strong braid from the essences of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam: God is love. Starr’s inter-spiritual quest (a birthright, she asserts) follows the same formula in each chapter, covering topics such as suffering, silence, and the feminine.
Each begins with quotations from the three religions’ holy books and seekers; then come scenarios that define the theme in a warm second-person voice; for example, in the chapter “Welcoming the Stranger,” Starr, who teaches world religions, describes doors you open--or do not. After knowledgeable and humbling descriptions, she lays out the religions’ teachings and profiles practitioners, for example, Christianity’s Dorothy Day, Judaism’s Baal Shem Tov, and the Sufi ecstatic Rabia Al-Adawiyya. In the non-fluffy afterword, Starr nudges travelers on the three paths to follow her sure-footed approach.
Cascadia Retreat Center, north of Seattle, Washington (USA)
This retreat is open to all seekers of any faith who wish to immerse themselves in the journey of divine love-drawing inspiration from multiple faith traditions.
Program includes silent meditation and prayer, teachings, small group interactive exercises, chanting, contemplative inquiry, and collective wisdom to kindle the fire of love in the heart.
Mirabai Starr will present teachings and inspirations from her ground-breaking new book God of Love, to be released in April, 2012. This seminal book presents the interspiritual path of love in Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, and builds powerful bridges between the three Abrahamic traditions.
Will Keepin will weave together the Bhagavad Gita, the Gospels, and Sufi teachings to articulate an interspiritual path of divine love that unites East and West - exemplified with inspirations from leading mystics and activists in each of these traditions.
Rev. Cynthia Brix will explore the emerging role of women's spiritual mastery, and the central importance of "mystic death" in walking the interspiritual path.
Fr. William Treacy will make a guest presentation on his unique 40 year commitment to the interspiritual path of love.
|
Author of critically acclaimed new translations of the Spanish mystics, and reflections on the unifying teachings at the heart of all spiritual paths. Mirabai Starr uses fresh, lyrical language to help make timeless wisdom accessible to a contemporary circle of seekers.
Daughter of the counter-culture, Mirabai was born in New York in 1961 to secular Jewish parents who rejected the patriarchy of institutionalized religion. Intellectual artists and social justice activists, they were active in the anti-war protest movement of the Vietnam era.
In 1972, Mirabai’s mother, father, and her younger brother and sister uprooted from their suburban life and embarked on an extended road trip that led them through the jungles of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, where they lived for many months on an isolated Caribbean beach, and ended in the mountains of Taos, New Mexico. There, the family embraced an alternative, “back-to-the-land” lifestyle, in a communal effort to live simply and sustainably, values that remain important to Mirabai to this day.
As a teenager, Mirabai lived at the Lama Foundation, an intentional spiritual community that has honored all the world’s faith traditions since its inception in 1967. This ecumenical experience became formative in the universal quality that has infused Mirabai’s work ever since.
Mirabai has been an adjunct professor of Philosophy and World Religions at the University of New Mexico-Taos since 1993. Her emphasis is on making connections between the perennial teachings found at the heart of all the world’s spiritual paths, in an effort to promote peace and justice.
Mirabai speaks and teaches nationally and internationally on the teachings of the mystics and contemplative practice, and is a certified bereavement counselor. She is available for interviews, speaking engagements, workshops and contemplative retreats.
She lives in the mountains of Northern New Mexico with her husband, Jeff Little (Ganga Das). Between them, Mirabai and Jeff have four grown daughters and six grandchildren. Mirabai’s youngest daughter, Jenny, was killed in a car accident in 2001 at the age of fourteen. On that same day, Mirabai’s first book, a translation of Dark Night of the Soul, was released. She considers this experience, and the connection between profound loss and longing for God, the ground of her own spiritual life.
|
|