Eternal Echoes: Exploring Our Yearning to Belong - Hardcover

O'Donohue, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060182806 ISBN 13: 9780060182809

Publisher: Cliff Street Books / HarperCollins, 1999

Synopsis

There is divine restlessness in the human heart, our eternal echo of longing that lives deep within us an never lets us settle for what we have or where we are. Now, in this exquisitely crafted, inspirational book, John O'Donohue explores that most basic of human desires--the desire to belong. It's a desire that constantly draws us toward new possibilities of self discovery, friendship, and creativity.

In Eternal Echoes John O'Donohue embarks upon a journey of discovery in the heart of our postmodern world--a hungry, lonesome world that suffers from a deep sense of isolation and fragmentation. With the thousand-year-old shelter of Divine Belonging now shattered, we seem to have lost our way in this magical, wondrous universe.

Here, as we explore perennial themes and gain insight from a range of ancient beliefs, we draw inspiration from Ireland's rich spiritual heritage of profound, mystical wisdom that will open pathways to peace and contentment, and lead us to live with creativity, honor, and compassion the one life that has been given us.

"In the pulse-beat is the life and longing, all embraced in the great circle of Belonging, reaching everywhere, leaving nothing and no one out. This embrace is mostly concealed from us who climb the relentless and vanishing escalator of time and journey outside where space is lonesome with distance. All we hear ware whispers, all we see are glimpses; but each of us has the divinity of imagination which warms or hearts with the beauty and depth of a world woven from glimpses and whispers, an eternal world that meets the gaze of our eyes and the echo of our voices to assure is that from all eternity we have belonged and to answer the question that echoes at the heart of all longing: while were are here, where is it that we are absent from?"
-- from Eternal Echoes

About this title

Review:

John O'Donohue (Anam Cara), a Celtic poet, scholar, and philosopher with an Irish brogue, speaks to the deepest calling of our soul: the longing to belong. "To be human is to belong," he explains. "Belonging is a circle that embraces everything; if we reject it, we damage our nature. The word 'belonging' holds together the two fundamental aspects of life: Being and Longing, the longing of our Being and the being of our Longing." Although this may sound like an elaborate Celtic circle knot, O'Donohue has nevertheless woven a solid and easy-to-grasp book that speaks to the soul's constant yearning. Every passage is a delight for the senses, as O'Donohue shares his lilting poetic language, his Celtic imagery and stories, and his fireside-chat wisdom. This is a broad-reaching yet highly focused book that dares to explore the realm of legitimate angels, the meaning of suffering, and, most poignantly, how life on earth may never quench the soul's thirst for belonging. --Gail Hudson

Book Description:

Shows that the eternal values of human life flourish only when we find sanctuary in family, community, & divine relationship

About this edition

• Publisher: Cliff Street Books / HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0060182806
• ISBN 13: 9780060182809
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 273