At the height of his extraordinary career, a man who exemplifies the virtues of the spiritual path speaks of some of his own transforming experiences and insights.

With anecdotes, humor, radiance,and a twinkle in his eye, a giant in the field of world religions shares profoundly personal experiences which have changed his life. Speaking at Kentucky's Cathedral Heritage Foundations' Festival of Faiths 2000, Professor Smith observes that the Festival's theme, Healing Mind, Body, and Soul "comes down to who we "are"-the recovery of the original divine station." Professor Smith describes what he considers to be the "deep lying elements" for understanding the healing of mind, body, and soul. He answers the basic questions of "who we are" by providing an insightful analysis of the four levels of the unconscious, the most important being the sacred which, he maintains, is linked with God as our "imago Dei." And, he recounts his own transforming experience of this place of Beauty, Bliss, and Joy, which each of us knows in dreamless sleep. Were the mind, body, and soul not re-charged or "healed" every night by direct contact with the Divine, we could not endure our lives. Professor Smith believes we must think more highly of our "selves." Additional treats are his mention of a personal hero: Wendell Berry, and his moving tribute to Ram Dass/Richard Alpert (Be Here Now), whose paralyzing stroke gave him the "gift of suffering": closeness to God and the dismantling of the "persona." But what is most moving about this precious footage is the wise and luminous presence of Huston Smith himself, a man who clearly embodies the virtues of the spiritual path. 

HUSTON SMITH is the author of The World's Religions (originally titled The Religions of Man) which, for several decades, has been the most widely used textbook on comparative religions and has sold well over 1.5 million copies. He was the focus of a five-part PBS TV show with Bill Moyers and his most recent book, Why Religion Matters: The Fate of the Human Spirit in an Age of Disbelief (HarperCollins 2001), was hailed by Publishers Weekly as a milestone.

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