Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

When Shackles become Wings: On Domesticity, Creativity, and Me

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I was married 25 years ago, while in a Ph.D programme in Creative Writing at the State University of New York Binghamton. I had just earned a BA and an MA in English from Somerville College, Oxford, then an MA in Creative Writing from Ohio State … [Continue reading]

Honesty Is the Narrow Gate to the Spiritual Life: Learning from My Daughter, Irene

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So I signed my daughter Irene up for a ministry called “LieBusters” at the David’s Tent worship festival. Five minutes in, her “LieBuster” asks her, “What is God saying to you?” Irene sits there, taken aback, and then tears stream down her … [Continue reading]

On Cancer, Declining Chemotherapy, Healing, and Future Plans

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So hi there, I am back…back to regular blogging, back to health-- physically, emotionally, spiritually and creatively. So, news of my world: I had surgery for colon cancer on November 25th, 2014, which now feels very long ago—like a bad, surreal … [Continue reading]

7 things I learned from Simon Vibert’s “Stress: The Path to Peace”

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Available on Amazon.com Available on Amazon.co.uk Living with high levels of stress can be physically and emotionally dangerous, so much so that stress tests like those by psychiatrists Holmes and Rahe can predict the likelihood of serious illness … [Continue reading]

When You Think it’s All Over, And That End is a New Beginning

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So John, beautiful, sensitive evangelist, is exiled to Patmos, a Roman penal colony, by the Emperor Diocletian. It’s all over for him. He who had been one of the three with Jesus at every climactic moment of his ministry; who had leaned on Jesus … [Continue reading]

“Thin Places,” Where the Boundaries between the Spiritual and Physical Worlds are Almost Transparent

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Celtic Christians prized “thin places,” where the boundaries between the spiritual and physical world are almost transparent. Where we can sense shimmering in the physical world the just-as-real, invisible, supernatural world, charged with the glory … [Continue reading]