A searching in many directions

singing and scones at Othona

There are leaping dolphins at Othona, and butterflies cheap canada goose flying to the moon, too. These are wall decorations at a canada goose black friday sale place by the sea near Bridport which is home to canada goose jacket outlet a community ‘rooted in a Christian heritage, open to a widening future’. They have been running the house as a canada goose outlet online retreat centre since 1965, after the community was founded at a centre in Essex. I stayed for a day’s ‘natural voice’ singing and an ‘open weekend’ of walks, talks and homemade food. canada goose outlet uk sale And all for around 130.

The previous owners of the building were canada goose factory sale a group of contemplatives known locally as ‘the white ladies.’ They did much of the building work. There is a simple stone chapel, basic rooms and more basic bathrooms, a well stocked library, biodiverse gardens, and canada goose fine canada goose outlet nyc walking down to the sea below.

Why do people make the journey and what do people find here? The sound of the sea and views of the canada goose outlet uk blue horizon from way past Lyme to back towards Portland Bill. A welcoming group of permanent residents sonorously named ‘the Core’ canada goose outlet online uk canada goose coats on sale who keep the place running with a team of shorter term helpers who cook, clean and canada goose outlet canada garden. Home grown food, birdsong and quiet contemplation.

Reasons for being here seem to be varied. One of our teachers was canada goose outlet store a former canada goose outlet in usa monk and resident, at least two others have been part of some kind of religious community. One runs a Vanier l’Arche community in London, caring for adults with learning disabilities. A hard pressed teacher had been visiting with her family for years. A recently widowed lady had been longing for a return visit. There were crafts people and landscape gardener, a wildlife canadian goose jacket teacher, a web designer and a young American Baha’i on a break from her theological studies. Typical weekend visitor: a woman in her 30s to 60s. A more disparate group joined us to sing barbershop tags, spirituals and more. Several defined themselves as pagan or ‘post Christian’ and there was a turquoise clad sufi who whirled as we sang a dhikr from her tradition.

Visitors are allocated tasks including preparing vegetables and cleaning their rooms. A bell is rung for meetings in the chapel where the day is formally begun and ended.

The library holds titles on radical religion, Rumi and chicken soup, works by Chatwin, Maupin, Spong, Dawkins and Dave Andrews, and a copy of Iris Murdoch’s ‘The nice and the good’, which makes much of a disparate people living together in disharmony.

So what is there of Murdoch’s canada goose outlet sale ‘good’ at Othona? Certainly a quiet and unpretentious warmth and acceptance for all kinds of diversity. A lot of laughter. A searching in many directions, from Enneagrams to mindfulness via TS Elliot and country walks. A warm and restful simplicity, away from the usual pressures including all the buzzing media that seem so Canada Goose cheap canada goose Coats On Sale essential but that waste so much time.

I dreamt buy canada goose jacket cheap of St Paul and went on a circular walk to the lovely warm sandstone church at Burton Bradstock where I was coaxed into the middle of Sunday service by https://www.doloresnet.com the hymn ‘Lord of the dance’. The sermon, delivered in a gentle Dorset burr by a long term incumbent on first name terms with all but one of his tiny congregation, quoted the uncompromising apostle and his injunctions to read scripture.

Back along the coast for roast lunch and and fossils and a river walk in Lyme Regis. In the evening a ‘One World Worship’ led by a Christian Aid trustee with a gift for primary school stye discussions on Ghandi, Aids and assorted religious texts.

I left Othona after a quiet morning reading with another trip to the sea where I found pebbles embedded with tiny fossils.

Outside Winterbourne Abbas I picked wild garlic in a wood where a straggle haired local directed me to a well tended 4,000 year old stone circle that is he said connected with mysterious religious ritual: ‘they’re on a ley line and are supposed to be growing, but I’ve not seen it yet!’

I resisted the temptations of Athelhampton and Kingston Lacy on the way home, but was most tempted by a garden opening at Charborough Park, home since Elizabethan times of the canada goose outlet toronto factory impressively named Plunkett Ernle Erle Draxes. The estate boasts what canada goose coats is claimed to be one of the longest brick walls in England.