The Saint Vincent Touch: Reflection on Meaning

For a quarter century, Saint Vincent has been an experience of defining importance to me as a person, a lecturer in religious studies, and a rabbi. There are the unforgettable events: when one of the nuns (pre-food service days) prepared a separate plate of food for me because she noticed that pork, a religiously prohibited food, was on the menu; a weekly lunch-time dialogue between a priest and a rabbi which began as a faith-to-faith encounter and turned into an exceptional friendship; recollections of students’ comments which make me grateful to be a teacher… “I have become stronger in my Christian faith through having taken your course”… “You taught me more about the nature of the Hebrew Bible than I have learned anywhere else”; gathering evergreen branches from around Saint Vincent to cover the harvest booth erected in my backyard in celebration of the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles. Saint Vincent has been and continues to be a blessed opportunity to learn, to teach, and to practice the art of growing in mind, in spirit, and in person.

Jason Z. Edelstein