To my knowledge, no one has ever done what I have done: explain in specific detail how the teachings and living example of the Jesuit mystic, philosopher, and priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin changed one life, mine.
The title of my upcoming book, Just Trust Life: A Journey with Teilhard de Chardin, comes from his writing.
Just trust Life:
Life will bring you high,
if only you are careful in selecting,
in the maze of events, those influences or those paths
which can bring you each time
a little more upward.
Life has to be discovered
and built step by step:
a great charm.
if only one is convinced
(by faith and experience)
that the world is going somewhere.
Letters to Two Friends 1926-1952. New York: New American Library, 1968. (1939) p. 127
Most Americans do not know about Teilhard, the French philosopher-priest-paleontologist who died 70 years ago. The poet, monk, and activist Thomas Merton may be more familiar.
Who was Teilhard? He described himself to Jean Houston as “a pilgrim of the future.” I love this phrase because it so perfectly captures his visionary perspective: he saw, felt, and deeply believed in the energy animating all life…especially the energy of love.
I am a grandmother now. Looking back on my life, I realized Teilhard’s insights guided me through some of my most difficult challenges. I didn’t know the way, but I knew he knew.
I paid attention, read his writings, studied his life. I wasn’t at all sure how to get there, but I believed that the world, my world, was indeed going somewhere. And if he could find his way through betrayal, heartache, and pain, I could too.
This is what evolution is all about.
Praise for Just Trust Life from thought leaders:
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin is an underappreciated spiritual master whose message is vital for our time. Christine Tracy’s memoir of how Teilhard has inspired her life and work is thus a needed and welcome contribution to the ongoing rediscovery of Teilhard’s teaching. For those who want to live out their spirituality, Christine’s book will be an inspiration.
—Steve McIntosh, J.D., author of The Presence of the Infinite
The rawness and honesty with which Tracy reveals parts of her inner life in Just Trust Life is remarkable, as is the deep affection with which she talks about her relationship to the man, Teilhard, who died in the year of her birth.
Just Trust Life is important reading for those who struggle with personal demons as well as those who have not yet come to understand Teilhard in the way Tracy has. The book will stay with me for a very long time. It made me a better version of myself.
—S. Michael Halloran, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Academics live in the world of ideas, but it’s rare that a scholar’s research shapes not only their professional life, but also their personal one. Christine Tracy’s memoir invites us into finely tuned scenes in which her intimate relationship to the work of Teilhard provides deepening guidance and eventual transformation. As Teilhard accompanies her through struggles with addiction, infidelity, divorce, a house fire, and a near-death experience, Tracy realizes that we’re never alone, and that we have the power to wake up. Refreshingly blending the intellectual with the mystical, Tracy’s prose betrays both her chops as a journalist and her awareness as a long-term seeker. Expect to be pulled with visceral descriptions of challenging experiences we all face and then surprised by the bracing yet comforting insight Tracy uncovers.
—Natalie Tomlin, author of the chapbook The Sound a Car Door Makes and Best of Net and Pushcart Prize nominee
Who is Pierre Teilhard de Chardin?
Frank and Mary Frost have produced this extraordinary video
“Teilhard: Visionary Scientist”
Christine M. Tracy 