This is a top contender to be my favorite book OF ALL TIME. (Edit: It IS my favorite book of all time.) (I received a digital ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.) Some books you meet at the right moment, and at a time when I've been more introspective and reflective, this has been a perfect companion, a welcome balm when things have felt fragile and uncertain in the world. The phrase "defiant rootedness," for example, so perfectly captures the idea of perseverance and hope in spite of all, the insistence of one's worth and determination to remain. As I reflected on this reaction, occurring across different days and weeks, I think it's due to how refreshing such honesty is, how welcoming to read the hope, to have her name truths. Time and again, I found myself near tears, or openly crying (not a familiar response).
Arthur Reilly's vulnerability in sharing insights gained from physical limitations, from being a Black woman of faith, and her transparency when discussing her Gramma and her father, lead to deep reflections. The fifteen chapters are framed around insights on dignity, place, belonging, fear, lament, liberation, and more.
Her words are a gift that, time and again, wrecked me in the most beautiful ways. THIS HERE FLESH by Cole Arthur Reilly is a stunning achievement. As she also writes memorably of her own lived experiences of childhood and selfhood, Arthur Riley boldly explores some of the most urgent questions of life and faith: How can spirituality not silence the body, but instead allow it to come alive? How do we honor, lament, and heal from the stories we inherit? In this indelible work of contemplative storytelling, Arthur Riley invites us to ponder the site of soul by examining our capacity to rest, wonder, joy, rage, and repair, and finding that our humanity is not an enemy to faith but evidence of it.Īt once a compelling spiritual meditation and a tender coming-of-age narrative, This Here Flesh speaks potently to anyone who suspects that our spirit and stories might have something to say to us. In these deeply transporting pages, Arthur Riley reflects on the stories of her grandmother and father and encounters of enfleshed, embodied spirituality. So writes Cole Arthur Riley in her unforgettable book of stories and reflections on discovering the sacred in her skin.
I believe that is what my father wanted for me and knew I would so desperately need: a tool for survival, the truth of my dignity named like a mercy new each morning."
"From the womb, we must repeat with regularity that to love ourselves is to survive. In her stunning debut, the creator of Black Liturgies braids stories from three generations of her family alongside contemplative reflections to discover the necessary rituals that connect us with our belonging, dignity, and liberation.
0 kommentar(er)
