Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Peace in the Desert

“Look to your right,” said Grandma Jaarsma as we drove through the little burg of St. David, “and you should see it in just a mile or two.” And then, there it was: a sturdy wooden 30-foot Celtic Cross appearing almost magically in the desert. St. David’s Monastery lies peacefully behind a grove of pecan trees in a most unlikely and lonely spot just southeast of Benson, Arizona on state highway 80. Like most monasteries, St. David’s had a small bookstore. And since I was driving, we made a pit-stop on our way from Tucson to Tombstone.

It was there I found a souvenir worth carrying home: a hand-painted calligraphy with green grasses alongside the quote from Mahatma Gandhi:

THE SEVEN ROOTS OF VIOLENCE
Worship, without sacrifice
Wealth, without work
Pleasure, without conscience
Knowledge, without character
Commerce, without morality
Science, without humanity
Politics, without principle

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