Margaret Avison, one of Canadas premier poets, is a highly sophisticated and self-conscious writer, both charming and intimidating at the same time. She calls to mind her more famous predecessors--the religious poets George Herbert, Gerard Manley Hopkins, and T. S. Eliot--as she vigorously engages both heart and intellect. ""She has forged a way to write against the grain, some of the most humane, sweet and profound poetry of our time,"" write the judges of the 2003 Griffin Poetry Prize.
Becoming a Christian in her mid-forties, her life and her vocation were transformed and her lyrics record...

There is a longstanding tradition that God whispers in our ears. He does not shout. It is in ""the holy whisper,"" writes the Quaker mystic, that we hear Abbas voice, not in the noise of clamoring crowds or the incessant barrage of social media. To hear the voice of God is an awesome thing--to know his thoughts, to intuit his love, to participate in his good pleasure. It is both a gift to be received and art to be cultivated. It can call to us when we least expect; but we can train ourselves to become receptive listeners.
We need help to separate the cacophony of voices calling to us from the...