LIfe and death and life

My dear Friends
This coming Sunday I will drive down to Bushey cemetery, near London, with a close friend. In the Jewish cemetery there my father, mother and brother are buried. My mother died at 97 in June 2006, my father in June 1972 and my brother, who was 20 years older than me in June 2003.

Actually June 18th was the date my father and brother died in different years.
On June 18th 1988, I had gone down to the sea in Cromer in Norfolk, after sitting an exam in Biblical Hebrew . This was to be my entry into Lucy Cavendish College in Cambridge to do a Hebrew degree. On the Saturday, June 18th, I was praying for my mother by the sea, when into my mind came a monastery in North Wales. It was there, a few years previously, that I had a profound experience in the silence, which was to lead me into the Catholic Church.
And then, later on this day, near Cromer, I had another profound experience, on the very anniversary of my father's death - his soul was leading me onto a new path.

I wrote about these experiences in a book, called The Moving Swan, published on 8 May 2006 in the context of a Presentation of My Life so Far. It took place in the Impington Church Hall, just outside Cambridge, with 50 guests, who sang in Hebrew with me, while I also talked about my life and afterwards signed copies of the book.I only realised later that 8 May is the day that World War Two ended in Europe.

I published The Moving Swan under the foundation of The Little Sisters of Joy. Amazingly, over 750 copies have been sold and distributed and it is already into its 3rd printing. I hope to display the cover of the book, and some excerpts from it in my next Blog entry.

If any of you are interested in buying it, I would like you know that it is not simply a book about my journey in faith; it documents my Jewish childhood, my wild youth and nervous breakdowns, my journeys, and, perhaps most of all, the people I have loved. It is quite a personal book and I would be happy to make it available for you.

So, just to tempt you, here is the opening line...

"I always was an unconventional little child..."

Shabbat Shalom
Sister Gila