What are thin places?

Almost every initial comment or email I receive from a visitor to my Thin Places blog or my Travels of a Maryland Writer blog ask "what are thin places?" or "how do you identify a thin place?"

The term thin place comes from the pre-Christian culture in Ireland and refers to a place where the veil between this world the "other world" or the "eternal world" is thin. Old tales tell of people and beings of the other world being able to pass back and forth between worlds in thin places.

Every person will identify a thin place differently. I can only share my own way. A thin place is sensed differently that our present world - you cannot see it, touch it, hear it, smell it, or taste it. Our sense of a thin place transcends the physical limitations of our five senses.

I sense a thin place in two ways.

1. I feel a strong sense of the past still present in the place.
2. I can hear God more clearly than in any other place - the sense of Divine Presence is very strong to me.

To me thinness has degrees - yes, some places are thinner than others.

Among the thinnest I've experienced - (posts to come later)

1. Rock of Cashel - Ireland
2. Glastonbury - England
3. Cashelkilty Stone Circle - Ireland
4. Uisnech - Ireland
5. Isle of Mull - Scotland

My article Walking through Thin Places goes into greater depth on spotting and sensing thin places.

Are there thin places in America? Sure, but I find them here and there scattered over large land masses. In Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England, the very ground cries out with them at every turn - every town.

Ardmore - County Waterford

Ardmore (slide show below) is a fishing village in the Southeast of Ireland in just over the border from County Cork in County Waterford. It is the legendary home of St. Declan who is said to have come to Ardmore, bringing Christianity before St. Patrick somewhere between 350 and 420 AD.

St. Declan built a monastery in a high place overlooking Ardmore Bay. Ardmore from the Irish Aird Mhor means Great Height. The ruins of a 13 century church and 8th century oratory as well as a well preserved round tower dominate the hillside where St. Declan first settled and built his monastery.

As you drive up the hillside, the round tower - which stands over 90 feet high - roars up from the landscape. It's quite overwhelming at first. Just near the tower are the ruins of St. Declan's Church (12th century), and below that is the 9th century oratory where St. Declan is believed to be buried. These three architectural relics rise out of a sea of graves, occupying nearly every available ground space. Some markers are new, shiny granite, some old limestone with faded inscription, and some merely a jagged stone set atop a lump.

Faith - centuries old perhaps - pervades the space around St. Declans Church and oratory. Religious scenes carved in stone during the 9th century were preserved and moved to this church when it was built in the 12th century. The scenes - Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the Judgement of Solomon, the Visit of the Magi, and more - were used to help teach the local community about the Christian faith. The oratory, still standing after 1200 years has been a place of private prayer and reflection. One needs only to be still in this religious compound and look out over the land and sea to sense the faith of men and women that has been nurtured and grown here.

The remnants of by-gone faith and human spirituality are not only in these buildings. There are unseen remnants - felt only in prayer here. All the elements here - the sky, the wind, the sea - seem brighter, somehow more vivid.

Ardmore is a thin place.

Adare - County Limerick

Adare is a perfect "first town" to visit when arriving in Ireland not only because of its proximity not only to Shannon Airport, but to many sites of interest in Muenster and Leinster.

Adare is an estate village developed by the Earl of Dunraven in the mid-19th century. Its anchor was Adare Manor (home of the earl) which still stands - now a luxury hotel surrounded by a golf course with miles of walking trails. The town is well known for its thatched-roofed cottages, upscale dining and public park.

I went to mass at Holy Trinity Abbey, a former Trinitarian monastery (the only Trinitarian monastery in Ireland). The Trinitarians served here in the early 13th century. Their mission was to raise money for ransoms to free hostages captured by the Moors during the Crusades. The Abbey has a stain glass window depicting a monk with a purse, trading the purse for the chains of a prisoner.

On the grounds of Adare Manor - in the middle of the golf course are the ruins of a Franciscan Friary, founded for the Franciscans in 1464 by the Thomas, the Earl of Kildare. This magnificent ruin still has the remains of a cloister walk which traces a path around a giant yew tree.

I ate an exquisite meal at The Blue Door Restaurant on the Main Street, housed in one of the thatched cottages. I stayed two nights just outside of town at Elm House, a Bed and Breakfast run by Mrs Pauline Heddeman.

Thin Place?
Adare is a homey place - a hospitable place. The ruins of the Franciscan Friary I found to be thin. Tracing the steps of medieval friars around the cloister walk and up the stone spiral stairway was moving. There is a dry holy water font, relatively unchanged over the past five hundred years.

The Friary is is thin place.