The book, “Where the Pure Water Flows” appears to be a magazine or brochure at first glance.  More than that, however, it is a theological treatise and a prayer book simultaneously.  It challenges the reader to transition from a mere consumer to one who conscientiously lives as a human being who appreciates creation.

Margaret Galiardi, OP, a sister of the Amityville Dominicans writes powerfully, "For us, as people of faith, the information that science is now offering us from the farthest reaches of the Universe has something to say about a God whose divine action is embedded in 13.7 billion years of Universe dynamics, not extraneous to it."  I highly recommend this book as a source of study for Southern Province Dominicans: friars, sisters, laity and friends.  It also serves as a jumping off point for further study and reflection about our concerns and our mission as preachers in the Church.

Divided into two parts, the book intersperses its text with opportunities for prayer and reflection on the material.  Part One deals with the new understanding of cosmology in relation to theology while Part Two explores "the implications of the story for our Christian faith and its articulation in the 21st century."

Galiardi quotes the eminent theologian, Sr. Elizabeth Johnson, CSJ:  "Early Christian and medieval theologians interpreted the natural world as God's good creation, a revealing pathway to the knowledge of God.  It was common for them to say that God has put two books at our disposal, the book of sacred scripture and the book of nature:  if we learn how to read the book of nature aright, we will be led to knowledge of God."  As Galiardi goes on to say, we acknowledge "that the material world is our way of perceiving the Divine, itself the carrier of the numinous presence of God."  The implications of this way of thinking lead us to a new appreciation for the importance of creation in our human existence.  With the data and research into climate change, for example, we are led to question how we utilize energy and how our patterns of consumption directly impact the environment.  Simultaneously, Galiardi and others would say that our "use" of the environment speaks of our relationship to God and understanding of who God is for us.

Where the Pure Water Flows saves the most challenging thought for the final pages where Galiardi explores the work of Raimon Panikkar and how his theology informs the implications for "bringing the insights of the larger Universe story to the Christian story." "Panikkar's thought . . . points to a sacredness at the heart of all life that is to be embraced even in the most mundane of life's activities . . .”

Certainly this book, as well as the others in the "Dominican Women on Earth" series, calls us to question how we perceive the Earth and the God who created it and us.  As Galiardi concludes, "we would do well to preach a worldview which honors what God has been about in the entire evolutionary process, honoring the diving unfolding at every stage and phase of the long 13.7-billion-year story.

----Jeffery Ott, OP

Promoter of Justice

Southern Dominican Province, U.S. A.

Book Review Archive

Just click on a book title below to read the review.

• A HISTORY OF CATHOLIC THEOLOGICAL ETHICS •
• Abraham Joshua Heschel: Essential Writings •
• A Captive Voice: The Liberation of Preaching •
• Adult Faith •
• PREACHING IN THE BLACK CHURCH •
• A Joint Review •
• A PRIMER ON THEOLOGICAL THINKING •
• Behind the Beautiful Forevers •
• Best Advice For Preaching •
• Remi De Roo - Chronicles of a Vatican II Bishop •
• COME, HAVE BREAKFAST - MEDITATIONS ON GOD AND THE EARTH •
• Compassion: Loving Our Neighbor in and Age of Globalization •
• The Death of Innocents •
• GOSPEL LIGHT: JESUS STORIES FOR SPIRITUAL CONSCIOUSNESS •
• Great World Religions: Islam •
• JESUS and the PRODICAL SON •
• Jesus: A Gospel Portrait •
• KINGDOM, GRACE, JUDGEMENT... •
• Living With Wisdom •
• LONGING TO SEE YOUR FACE – PREACHING IN A SECULAR AGE •
• How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row •
• Christ and the Spirit: Catholic Perspectives Through the Ages •
• Mark's Passion Narrative •
• Moses in Pharaoh's House •
• ...and the Mountains Echoed •
• Preaching and Catholic Social Teaching •
• PREACHING MATTERS: A PRAXIS FOR PREACHERS •
• Preaching the Mystery of Faith: The Sunday Homily •
• Racial Justice and the Catholic Church •
• MAKING SENSE OF MYSTERY - A PRIMER ON THEOLOGICAL THINKING •
• Redeeming the Past •
• Revisioning Spirituality •
• SPEAKING WITH AUTHORITY •
• St. Dominic: A Story of a Preaching Friar •
• THE CRISIS OF BAD PREACHING •
• After Sunday: A Theology of Work •
• The Rhythm of Being... •
• This Is Our Exile •
• True and False Reform In the Church •
• The Council and the Making of the Ultramontane Church •
• Voicing the Vision: Imagination & Prophetic Preaching •
• We Speak the Word Of the Lord •
• Where the Pure Water Flows •
• Written Text Becomes Living Word... •