Walking the Labyrinth Sally Welch (Canterbury Press – £9.99)

There can be no doubt that one of the successful modern spiritual tools is the labyrinth. Meditative walking of the pathways of labyrinths has taken off and intriguingly can be found within the modern experience of high and low church folk alike. But what to make of it?

This book is an attempt to put the labyrinth experience into words and is broadly successful. There are ideas for what to do and what to think about whilst meandering the twisting pathways of the labyrinth itself but there is much more too. There are detailed descriptions of how to construct a classic labyrinth. Practical measurements and methodologies are present alongside the more spiritual suggestions.

However, the ideas don’t end there. I particularly liked the idea of getting a team of people to collect the rubbish on a beach before making it in to a labyrinth in which to contemplate the ecological crisis and the state of the natural world.

There are labyrinth liturgies and labyrinth meditations. Labyrinth readings and labyrinth lections. The only hesitation one might have is to ask whether or not such wordiness is really in keeping with the object of the exercise. Is not labyrinth walking essentially about doing something thoughtful and meditative that is not all bound up in words? Letting go of language is for many the goal of prayer in these pathways.

Notwithstanding that one reservation, many who have encountered the labyrinth in gardens or retreat houses, in installations in church or university may want to pick up this little book and trace out their prayers in the pattern of its pages.

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