The Way of the Rose

What happens when a former Zen Buddhist monk and his feminist wife experience an apparition of the Virgin Mary. When a vision of a mysterious "Lady" invited Clark Strand and Perdita Finn to pray the rosary, not only were they disinterested in becoming Catholic, they were finished with institutional religion altogether. Their main spiritual concerns were the fate of the planet and the future of their children and grandchildren in an age of ecological collapse. But this Lady barely even referred to the Church and its proscriptions. She spoke of the miraculous power of the rosary to transform lives and heal the planet, revealing the secrets she had hidden within the rosary's prayers and mysteries-secrets of a past age when forests were the only cathedrals and people wove "rose garlands" for a Mother whose loving presence was as close as the ground beneath their feet. She told Strand and Finn: The rosary is My body, and My body is the body of the world. Your body is one with that body. What cause could there be for fear. Weaving together their own remarkable story of how they came to the rosary, their discoveries about the eco-feminist wisdom at the heart of this ancient devotion, and the life-changing revelations of the Lady herself, the authors reveal an ancestral path-available to everyone, religious or not-that returns us to the powerful healing rhythms of the natural world. Advance praise for The Way of the Rose"My favorite part of this robust and exquisitely written book is the storytelling. I love the way the authors work together to weave a luminous tapestry of travel memoir, tender awakening, and championship of Our Mother the Earth. While the particular spiritual insights are consciousness-raising and heart-opening, it does not matter what the reader's religious orientation (or lack thereof) may be: This is a universal story of love, a huge-hearted invitation to step up and into the field of the sacred feminine, a gratifying guide to a life of joy and service. "-Mirabai Starr, author of God of Love and Wild Mercy "Clark Strand and Perdita Finn have answered a collective need to help us discover the empowering and miraculous non-denominational spiritual practice of prayer. The Way of the Rose is brilliantly written and filled with a wealth of stories meant to inspire us. I feel blessed by reading this beautiful and sacred book. "-Sandra Ingerman, author of Soul Retrieval and The Book of Ceremony