St. George, Roses, Books, Abuse - Healing & Hopeful Connections

William Newton posted an article on The Dawn Patrol hosted by Dawn Eden. Dawn is the author of My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints and The Thrill of the Chaste.

Newton’s article is entitled, “How St. George’s feast became the “Day of the Book’” The Tweet about it caught my eye since I have a good friend named George. It provides a brief overview of the legend of St. George and traces the roots of a number of customs associated with St. George and the saint’s feast day (Examples: men giving a rose to a woman; women giving a book to a man).

But the article then went in a surprisingly different direction. William takes us to a much deeper, profound and hopeful place dealing with the topic of healthy human sexuality, reconciliation and redemption and the healing of sexual violence (topics that Dawn covers in her books).

Here in Philadelphia, in the midst of child abuse trials, priests on administrative leave (still), plenty of bad news, not a little sensationalizing instead of sober, responsible, informed, sensitive journalism, lots of questions, not a lot of answers, people hurting, people angry….somehow I found something comforting and deeply hopeful in what William wrote. Can’t quite explain it but I like the direction his conversation went and the good work that Dawn seems to be doing. People lighting candles instead of cursing the darkness. Personally, I could use a little more of it.

BTW, you might also want to check out William Newton’s blog: “Blog of the Courtier.“