Godliness

For centuries, cleanliness has been a seminal part of some of the religions of the world. A Zen garden can be a study in the beauty of unclutter. Monasteries within many religions are deliberately clean and spartan places so one can more easily get in touch with God. Not all religions, however, embraced clean as the path to purity of soul.

Join us this week as we explore ideas about cleanliness and order in different faiths and traditions. Writers Katherine Ashenburg, Marc Poirier and Erika Ritter offer their perspectives. Kathleen Ashenburg has looked at clean through the centuries, and uncovered a few surprises along the way. She is the author of The Dirt on Clean: An Unsanitized History, published by Alfred A. Knopf Canada.

Marc Poirier is a professor at Seton Hall Law School in Newark, New Jersey. Throughout his life, Professor Poirier found clutter to be comfortable, familiar, and safe, until he got sick with lymphoma. It was this illness that drew him to discover a spirituality in order. Marc Poirier is the author of an essay called Clutter and the Matter of Life and Death. It's part of a collection called Next To Godliness: Finding the Sacred in Housekeeping, published by SkyLight Paths.

In an essay called Sweet Disorder, writer and broadcaster Erika Ritter argues that a little chaos and disorder might just be good for us.

Our thanks to Kim Woodburn, co-host of the British hit TV series, How Clean is Your House, and W Network's Kim's Rude Awakenings in Canada, for sharing her cleaning wisdom with Tapestry.

Music featured on the program:

Wash Me Clean, by k.d. lang, from the CD Ingenue.