Episode 36: An Audio Essay: How Observing Advent and Following the Church Year Make Me Feel Less Alone

Hope for the Lonely with Charlotte Donlon

In this episode, Charlotte reads an essay she wrote about how the church years helps her feel less alone.
As we engage more deeply with the ancient streams of art and faith, how they inform one another, and how all of this can create profound new possibilities for belonging, we need ways to respond.
Through her work as a spiritual director for writers, artists, and those all along the belief-and-unbelief spectrum, Charlotte Donlon explores how belonging intersects with the contemplative life.
This essay was originally published in Christianity Today in 2019. This audio essay is also going to be live on Charlotte's Our Faith in Writing podcast.
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Charlotte Donlon helps readers and clients notice how they belong to themselves, others, God, and the world. Charlotte is a writer, a spiritual director for writers, the Church Street Coffee & Books Writer-in-Residence, and the founder and host of the Our Faith in Writing podcast and website. She’s also the host for the Hope for the Lonely and A Writer’s Diary podcasts. Her writing has appeared in The Washington Post, The Curator, The Christian Century, Christianity Today, Catapult, The Millions, Mockingbird, and elsewhere. Her first book is The Great Belonging: How Loneliness Leads Us to Each Other. You can subscribe to her newsletter and connect with her on Twitter and Instagram.