Wide Spot: an internal opening created by the convergence of heart and word.

I wrote my first book about three months after I started reading, enchanted by the written word that could create whole new worlds. I wanted to weave that magic, too.

Sixty-odd years later, I am still trying to conjure life out of words. I know that the right words can ripen my heart, root me in deeper reality, and reveal the shining effervescence in which we live, and move, and have our being. So I write to express the sacredness—the unimaginable depth and joy and sorrow—of daily life. I write because I long to turn that which is half-dead into dancing and that which is skin-deep into fathomless mystery.

Here’s what you’ll find on this website:

Singing the Red Dress Song” is a book-length collection of essays which trace the uneven/hilarious/heartbreaking path of growth in spiritual life.

The “Writings” page contains “Wide Spot,” the accumulated short, never-mention-God essays that I write monthly for the Valley Voice newspaper; and “Stillpoints,” which covers a broad territory: bears, consciousness, Alzheimer’s, St. Francis of Assisi, skinny dipping, and Eucharist, to name a few. Sprinkled throughout all this writing are podcasts offering contemplative practices or a spoken-word version of a given essay.

The other pages— “About,” “Calendar,” “Collaborations”—should be self-explanatory. If you’re interested in more information, just email me here. I’m happy to share retreat outlines and practices.

You can help me defray the costs of keeping all this material available by donating to Therese’s Wide Spot. Located on the bottom of each page is an email address to which you can send an e-transfer. (However, e-transfers only work for Canadians.) Alternatively, you can send a cheque of any nationality to the address listed there. And whether you donate or not, please feel free to use what you find here. All I ask is attribution—because I wrote all this for you.

Latest Posts

Witness

Every night at 8 p.m., after the war began, Pope Francis called Holy Family Church in Gaza. Every night until he drew his last breath, Francis faithfully picked up the phone and checked in. I haven’t been able to get this picture out of my head. Actually, what I haven’t been able to get out …

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Wide Spot: All Shall Be Well

Many of my friends put some pithy quotation across the bottom of their emails. The extracts vary from “I have a photographic memory; unfortunately it was never fully developed” to a definition of liminal space. But one quote occurs repeatedly. Originating with medieval mystic Julian of Norwich, it reads, “All shall be well, and all …

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Wide Spot: Despair

For me, it starts in the gut: it registers that I’m feeling anxious or even nauseous since reading that news article. For someone else, it starts in the head: noticing there is an endless loop of some distressing event playing in their mind. For yet another, it is felt in the heart: a weight on …

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Wide Spot: Anchored

In the book Unshakeable by trauma therapist Jo Ann Rosen, there’s a discussion of anchors, those simple practices that return us to awareness. Rosen speaks about anchors because trauma responses bypass all our good skills. We forget what we know and react instinctively. Instinctive reaction may be the perfect response when a rattlesnake is rattling, but it’s …

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Reader Reflections

  1. You have my attention, Therese, i’ve been wrestling with the destructive side of God/nature for a long time. It scares…

  2. Thank you, Therese! I have found these last 6+ weeks to be such an intense time of unease. But still…

  3. “God saves us from nothing and stands with us in all things.” Yes! As I age, the truth of this…

  4. Response to “The Destroyer” This writing “hits home” to me. While wrestling with how to deal with the destruction going…

Like what you read? I would love to have your support!
Canadians can send an e-transfer to descamp@widespot.ca. Everyone else, I take cheques of all nationalities.
Box 452, New Denver, BC, V0G 1S0, Canada