Just as an aside, there is no more wondrous sight for me as an ardent booklover than coming home and driving my car to the set space on the drive, placing my finger on the garage door control, then pausing in the moment as the door quietly ascends to be confronted with the sight of the all-encompassing bookshelves lining each of the garage walls. There, so neatly packed into the respective shelf space provided, stand so many of my friends and companions who have accompanied me through endless explorations and seasons of life and faith, transporting me to time and place and more beyond simple imagining.

I eventually found the one book I was initially looking for but not before losing myself in the row of books sitting just below that being searched for. My arms were full as I traversed the short distance back to my study desk and thus lost myself again in time remembering, reacquainting, the treasures within, and how over time the wisdom imbedded had found its way to enlarge my mind, heart and soul.

The fruit of my search and sacred remembering was one of the written works I most treasure from the pen of the late Frederick Buechner, ordained American Presbyterian, who died late last year at the age of 96 years. His calling never found expression in any parish appointment but rather was realized through the vocation of writing. The fruits over his lifetime included a prodigious quantity of novels, memoirs and essays that explored the human condition from a uniquely inspirational, theological, humorous and real lived experience. I made my first acquaintance with his writing very early in my ministry and devoured anything and everything that flowed from him. Some thirty-plus of his books line a section of my shelves as constituting my most sacred treasures. On this day, this sacred diversion of my focused attention caused me to re-read and ponder afresh the following extract from Buechner’s memoir Telling Secrets, an extract I have noted on many occasions in reflecting on my own life and faith journey.

What we hunger for perhaps more than anything else is to be known

in our full humanness, and yet that is often what we also fear more

than anything else. It is important to tell at least from time to time

the secret of who we truly and really are . . . because otherwise we

run the risk of losing track of who we truly and fully are and little

by little come to accept instead the highly edited version which we

put forth in hope that the world will find it more acceptable than

the real thing. It is important to tell our secrets too because it

makes it easier . . . for other people to tell us a secret or two of

their own.”

- Frederick Buechner novelist/minister (from his memoir Telling Secrets)