What is a Sacred Historian?

Parma Cathedral, 2019. Photo by author.

The phrase I have chosen to call myself may conjure up images of someone poring over placidly smiling Madonnas or gazing skyward at towering cathedral pillars. And while I do enjoy both of these activities, and many more related to the study of religious art and architecture, I want to clarify that this is not what I mean.

For me, the study of history is nothing more or less than sacred. I do not mean to say that I only study that which is traditionally considered sacred, or that everything that has happened in the long tale of our history was moral or divinely sanctioned. Rather, I believe the commitment itself, the pursuit of our collective story, connects us in a strikingly human way to that which is greater than ourselves, and helps us recognize that we are but one part of the great whole. An important, utterly unique part to be sure, whose talents and ideas and decisions are in service of the bigger story.

By reading the words, absorbing the artworks, and reflecting on the philosophies left to us by this community of collective ancestors, we get to know the people whose decisions echo down to us, people who made wonderful and terrible choices, and everyday, ordinary choices which affected their families and neighbors, deliberate choices on how best to live their lives and spend their time here on earth.

Church in southern Alaska. Photo by author.

It is the deep romanticization of this pursuit of knowledge, of consciously living inside the flow of history, falling in love with the ideas and opportunities of this world through the devoted study of how human beings relate to and shape the world around them, seen and unseen, that I refer to here. The love of both the story itself and the storytellers who strive to understand truth through everything that has happened, committing to making our own decisions based on the people we admire, and taking into ourselves the best of what they had to give - novels, poetry, statues, cathedrals, stupas, gardens, paintings, philosophies, moral codes, and ways to exist more harmoniously together - these are what the sacred historian studies.

And through it all, we listen for the strain of music, look for the glint of gilded thread weaving through the tapestry, the flickering of the divine as a candle in a gentle wind, learning how others heard the call too. Exploring it, expressing it, revering and attending to it, and playing with it in life-affirming exuberance. In exploring the human mind, heart, and soul, we affirm our Aliveness and pay homage to the Aliveness of those who came before us who speak to us still in ongoing creation.

Some days, to be sure, it is harder to hear the call. Some days it seems entirely silent. And somewhere, in some time, there was someone who felt that too.

So keep listening.