Universal and Local- Christine Ellis

2.) Lane’s axiom that says sacred place is both centrifugal and centripetal, local and universal was particularly poignant for me last week. There was no wind last Thursday and while I was walking to class I was trying to imagine a very cold, windy place. My mind immediately drifted to Canada. I spent last summer and a good part of winter break there. In January, I went hiking by a place called Lake Windvermere. A mountain twice the size of any I had ever seen rose up to meet my eyes. I didn’t think there was any way I could ever climb even half-way to the summit. To my surprise, I finished. At the top of the summit I saw two people meditating next to this pile of rocks. It wasn’t a huge pile of rocks like on that trail in Scotland, but a pile of rocks is a pile of rocks nonetheless. I talked to them for a little while and they told me that the second they saw the rocks, they had to acknowledge it in a spiritual way. They told me that the rocks demanded attention. I believed them after I looked at it for a few minutes. After they left, two more hikers came up to the summit and one of them gasped and said, “There it is, there’s the old shrine. I told you it was here!” I had never thought about it before but in hind sight, I guess when something really moves people, word gets around quickly. As more and more people come and add their experience to the collective memory of the place, I would guess, it becomes more sacred and special.