Sacred Roads: Adventures from the Pilgrimage Trail

by Nicholas Shrady

Book Overview

How many of us have longed to travel the same roads that Jesus traveled? To walk in the footsteps of the Buddha? In Sacred Roads, Nicholas Shrady journeys to some of the most holy destinations in the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060671122
• ISBN13: 9780060671129
• Release Date: January 1999
• Publisher: HarperOne
• Length: 268 Pages
• Weight: 0.98 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.7" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

I would think a lot of people can relate to the author.

...a bit estranged from our traditional religious upbringing without wanting to abandon it totally, open-minded to other possibilities. I found him candid. It's much more believable (and interesting) to portray religious devotees as real people with human shortcomings. Yea, he's sometimes judgmental and arrogant; I allowed him that under his circumstances. Though Shrady has, admirably, immersed himself in the local culture and history, I found some of the historical explanation lengthy and tedious.

Outstanding Personal Quest

Nicholas Shrady allows us to join him on an arduous quest for the spirit which suffuses the world's great religions. For those of us who are no longer young and cannot physically traverse the Sacred Roads he allows us to join him in spirit. The descriptions of the "Holy Places" from Medjugorje, through the rivertrip down the Ganges, the trek across Northern India into Nepal in pursuit of the Buddha's footsteps, the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, Palestine and eventually Anatolia are most vivid and so are the encounters with others of God's children on the road. His experiences in the "Promised Land" struck an especially responsive chord since I had undergone similar tribulations by El Al personnel, although I was spared a rectal examination. Finally I am grateful to Dr. Shrady for having introduced me to Rumi whom I had not yet counted among my acquaintances. Having said all this let me warn readers that this book is an honest account and as such may not be viewed with favor by some whose religion demands adherence to dogma rather than an inner feeling of God in all His manifold works.

outstanding, thought-provoking book!

I read this book as someone who has struggled with Christianity for many years and have finally and recently come to terms with it in the Orthodox Church. I can relate quite personally to Mr. Shrady's struggles with his faith, and read with great interest his impressions of Medjugorje: what makes this place sacred - the "visions" of the Blessed Virgin or just that the place evokes such faithfulness? I was saddened to read that in the land of Christianity's birth, its followers are leaving, and soon there will be none left. Mr. Shrady writes honestly but sensitively about why this is so and this, I think, is a major contribution of this book. More authors, more Christians should become aware of this deeply troubling situation.Mr. Shrady has the blessing of an open mind, and describes all he sees with genuine respect. Practices that are alien to him, temples, all of it are beautifully and I am sure, accurately, described. I have also been booted unceremoniously from a few Hindu temples in India, so I know whereof he speaks. Only two small niggling details. First,in the section on the Hindu pilgrimage, he writes of the Brahman religion, and the Brahman caste; it should actually be Brah-MIN, Brahman being the Absolute One, or the God-head.Second, it might have been interesting to read why Mr. Shrady made these pilgrimages - was he "shopping" for a religion? Trying to escape something or find something? Otherwise, this is a fabulous book that I heartily recommend.