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5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
Part Anthropology, Part Geography, All Journey Dec 14, 2009
By Fritz R. Ward
"dayhiker"
Brad karelius is an Episcopal Priest with a calling. His pastoral call is to a church in Santa Ana, but his true calling is to the desert, specifically the Owens Valley. After years of ministering to a growing and diverse congregation in urban Santa Ana, all while taking care of his son who contracted encephalitus at an early age and struggles with regular seizures, Fr. Brad found himself called to the desert to experience a renewal of faith and God. Initially his journey met with some skepticism (one parisioner recommended that he carry a revolver) but as time went on his pilgrimages attracted more than curiosity. Those who knew him found Fr. Brad changed and wanted to experience this sort of retreat for themselves. This book is an attempt to share his experiences.
The fathers (and mothers) of the early church often retreated to the desert to form the first monastic communities. The stark and barren landscape heightens the senses and can jolt one out of the everyday world into a state of awareness where one sees through opposites to unity and wholes. This awareness is the basis of virtually all mystical traditions in every religion, but is especially prominent among the early Christian monastics. The desert, for Fr. Brad, is a place where, even without thinking about it, one engages in continuous prayer. Just as the prophet Elijah meets God in a cave in the desert, so Fr. Brad, at the mouth of a cave, finds himself fully accepted by God.
This book is divided into multiple chapters, each of which features a particular location in the southern Owens Valley. Each area is lovingly described, includes a description of the physical geography of the region, and often describes the Native American settlements in the area. Karelius rightly recognizes the pinyon nut as the center of the culture for these people (Paiutes), just as the buffalo was for the plains Indians. Indeed, one could read this book almost exclusively for the natural and local history and appreciate it.
For many readers, however, the highlight of the book will be Fr. Brad's internal reflections on the "sacred" sites he visits. Topics one might not expect from a "spiritual" pilgrimage are discussed at length, including the recent revelations of molestation by priests, and the all too frightening comparisons between the American concentration camp of Manzanar and the German camp at Buchenwald. But regardless of the topic or the locale, readers will always find Fr. Brad reflective and insightful.
Inspirational pictures which are found with some profusion at many Christian bookstores rarely feature desert scenes. Oceans, mountains and towering trees seem for many to point to the majesty of God. Still others experience their spirituality in towering cathedrals. But the desert offers a lasting, and in many ways, deeper experience of the divine. Its apparently harsh exterior invites those who live in it to find both beauty and divinity in a place many would not think to look. But the desert, and God, calls us out of our civilized life and this book offers a map of where to go. It comes highly recommended.
Fritz Ward, Dec 2009.
I could not think of how to work this into the review, but readers who are fascinated by the Owens Valley should also look for Mary Austin's classic, The Land of Little Rain. It is a nice supplement to this volume.
3 of 3 found the following review helpful:
Walk with God in the desert Mar 05, 2010
By Kathy W
This 2009, 145-page book is a spiritual journey through meditative walks in the California desert. Through an appreciation of the history of the land and the people who lived there, our author touches God in humbling prayer and feels the struggle of the people who once lived in these sights.
The author, Brad Karelius, is an Episcopal priest in Los Angeles and a member of the Nevada Archeological Society. He takes you on a journey to various sites in the Owens Valley, traveling through the desert and often along Highway 395. He will drive as far as he can, then get out of the car and proceed on foot the rest of the way.
With maps from the U.S. Geological Survey in California for the journeys, Brad provides very specific instructions of exactly how to get to the points of interest. Once you get "there," he provides a history lesson. The book also has photos (some by the author and some from museums and libraries) to help you join in the history lesson.
He tells us about the Japanese Internment Camp "Manzanar", where Japanese people were held captive during WWII by the U.S. Government, because they were deemed a threat (even the U.S. citizens who were Japanese). He speaks often of the Paiute Indians who lived in the Owens Valley and how they gathered and ate the pinyon pine nuts, grinding them into a paste for protein sustenance. He mentions the conversation he had with John Wayne many years ago when they met in Orange County at a J.C Penney store. He tells us how the silver mines made way for Los Angeles and about the old Wells Fargo stagecoach stops in now abandoned areas of the desert. (There is a lot more history than just this little bit I am providing.)
In his meditations with God, Brad takes us on journeys back in time, where we travel with the Paiute Indians to learn how they lived, to wooden marked burial sites, to Cerro Gordo, to the Sierra Nevada, to excavation digs, to the Lone Pine and Alabama Hills area where movies are still made, etc. etc. etc. This book is not about rushing through an area to sight see, but about taking one's time to walk through a piece of history, stopping to smell the roses, so to speak, one at a time.
You can use this book as a walking guide to tour the sites yourself or you can view them through the eyes of our author. (Since I'm not a hiker, I will view them through the author's knowledgeable eyes.) BUT, if you ARE a hiker, Brad gives you very specific instructions so you don't miss anything.
3 of 3 found the following review helpful:
The Beauty of the High Desert Nov 30, 2009
By Alejandra Vernon
"artist & illustrator"
"The Spirit in the Desert" is an outstanding and detailed guide book, but it is so much more as well; it's a journey inward as Father Karelius takes us to the places of serenity where we can hear God's voice with the most clarity. It is interspersed with personal reflections, on his life as Rector of the Messiah Parish in Santa Ana, California, and of his son Erik, the recipient of so much love and special care.
Some of the hikes described are quite arduous, and some more tailored for the less experienced like me, who would most likely start with the lovely walk by George Creek (Sacred Site VII) and the Sagebrush Ocean (Sacred Site X). All 11 of the sites in this book are off of Highway 395 in the Owens Valley, where the Paiute lived hundreds of years ago, and more recently, have been seen in several Western and other genre films. There is even a chapter about a chance meeting with John Wayne, at a mall.
There is a moving chapter on Manzanar (VIII), one of the 10 concentration camps used to "evacuate" Japanese-Americans during WWII. As the author writes, "...it was an evil spirit that inspired the creation of the concentration camp at Manzanar and that same spirit continues to feed and inspire revisionist history and denial today." This was a dark event in our past, and one that we can hope will never be repeated; by visiting this site, we make sure we never forget.
Every chapter starts with a detailed map, and is scattered throughout with black and white photos, some taken recently by the author, and some of vintage era. The c.1930 one of "Pine Nut Gathering" is my very favorite.
If you live nearby within driving distance, or in a faraway land, "The Spirit in the Desert" will inspire you to see these sacred sites, that are some of California's lesser known wonders. Make sure your boots and hat are good for the journey, take lots of water, and don't forget a copy of this marvelous book, which gives you an almost step by step guide in what to look for in the immense beauty of the high desert.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 A deeply personal invitation to a spiritual journey. Jun 24, 2011
By Cynthia Danute Cekauskas, LCSW
"Lithuanian American Princess"
This is a very special book written by an Episcopal priest about his regular retreats into the desert of his native southern California to be with God. Father Karelius begins his book describing the challenges and emotional pain of having to raise a developmentally disabled son who suffers from terrible seizures. The compassion the author feels toward his son is profound. This is impressively reflected in the author's writing style. He then goes on to describe his desert retreats where through regular meditation and focusing on passages of scripture he renews himself as a spiritual guide "who can inspire, coach and encourage a deepening relationship with God." He admits that "Out of my weakness and brokenness, not personal power I have found my authentic path of discipleship with Jesus."
I can honestly appreciate this sentiment even though the medium one uses to achieve that closeness with God can vary with the individual. Not being from desert country with no personal desire to visit same I can nonetheless translate this communion with nature in my own particular way. Myself a first generation European American whose parents were BOTH born in Lithuania my own personal journey goes back to another continent. There volksmarching in the hills and forests of southern Germany I experience "a landscape as big as God's heart" where "my heart and soul quieted." Like Father Karelius: "The beauty and majesty of creation spilling out before me was so wonderful to behold that it could hurt. That inner voice that criticizes everyone, making me feel like I am unappreciated and unloved, became silent. Here with the Spirit...I come once again to the presence that is love. My heart fills with thanksgiving and gratitude for all of God's goodness...."
If I did live in southern California, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevade or other such state I think I would be compelled to visit the areas the author so vividly describes. In fact in reading this book one almost FEELS like he has already been there. I particularly love the references to ghost towns and ruins of former established communities where the author invites you to "imagine the people who journeyed here and carved a life in these desert places, facing the real threat of sudden death, from loneliness and isolation." It makes ME appreciate the challenges my own parents had to endure fleeing their native Lithuania as Soviet tanks approached in July 1944 threatening death or forced deportation robbing them of their land, their homes, their very way of life. They were then placed into a postion where they had to carve out their own future lives first in the Displaced Persons (DP) camps of American occupied Germany and then to a whole new country whose language they barely knew. I made my own first pilgrimage to Lithuania in 1997--only nine years after that country had regained its indpendence after 46 years of Soviet domination. Another translation to be sure but one especially meanginful to me in a personal way. To those of you from the Southwest a more direct interpretation is likelier.
The author aptly concludes the book by writing: "We do not control the results of the Kingdom. What matters is our availability to being grown by the Holy Spirit. It means being present to God and being open to receiving the kingdom....Where is the map to help me grow spiritually and grow the church? The map is still within me and within you. The map is the mystical connection you and I have with God. Our attention presence and availability to God." Now THOSE are words to live by!
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
God in the Most Unlikely Places Dec 02, 2010
By Matthew Morine
As a man who enjoys the outdoors, and as a disciple that lives for adventure, this book provides both. The author does a excellent job of blending spirituality and wildness. He has a deep spirituality because of the conditions of the land. You will be transported into another world, one in which you will be encouraged, and challenged. He spiritual formation is deep, because he has had to strive for God. But like those who fight for the voice of the Lord, he discovered it in a dry land. This is ironic, a place of nothingness, but the place where he was filled by the Spirit of the Lord. As quickly as you can, pick up this book and be transported into a deeper walk with God.
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