Listen: I speak on "Healing the Memory: What St. Ignatius Loyola and Pope Francis Can Teach Us"

On July 31, the feast of St. Ignatius of Loyola, I had the honor of speaking at Washington, D.C.'s Catholic Information Center on "Healing of Memory: What St. Ignatius Loyola and Pope Francis Can Teach Us."

The talk was almost entirely new. My aim was to make the core message of my book My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints relevant for everyone seeking healing from painful memories—not only those who have suffered abuse—and to do so by way of Pope Francis's Jesuit spirituality.

Here is a recording of the talk and the question-and-answer period that followed, courtesy of the kind people at the CIC.

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Please pray for me as I prepare to move from Washington to Mundelein, Illinois, to do my doctorate in sacred theology.

Also, if you have benefited from my writing or speaking, please consider making a donation to help me as I continue my studies and as I continue to share the message of My Peace I Give You. Thank you and God bless you.

Watch now: "What the Saints Can Teach Us About Purification of Memory"

Courtesy of Diocese of Aberdeen videographer Father Tad Turski, here is the talk I was pleased to give March 2 at Greyfriars Convent in Elgin, Scotland.

The topic, "What the Saints Can Teach Us About Purification of Memory," is taken from my book My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints.

Watch now: I speak at the Aberdeen Bishop's House on healing of memory

Looking for my U.K. tour dates? Click here!

I'm delighted to share with you one more video of my current U.K. tour, this one from last Saturday night, when I spoke to young adults at the Bishop's House in Aberdeen, Scotland, last Saturday night, sharing the message of my book My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints. Although this talk is on the same topic as the other video I posted from this tour—"What the Saints Can Teach Us about Healing of Memory"—much of the content is different, plus it includes a question-and-answer period.

In this particular talk, among the topics I discuss is "inner healing," which is popular particularly among those who have a charismatic bent and those who are involved in deliverance ministry. While lauding the intentions of those who seek to help their fellow Christians heal from painful memories, and being grateful for any and all healing God has brought from their efforts, I am critical of certain elements of that approach. In this talk, I propose a way to approach healing of memories that has the benefits of "inner healing" without its attendant risks. I would welcome dialogue with proponents of "inner healing" who are open to a charitable critique.

Please pray for me and my audiences as I prepare to speak tonight in Glasgow and then go on to England before heading home on Monday (see my tour dates).

Welcome, Catholic World Report readers!

Today, Catholic World Report features an interview in which I share the message of my book offering a Catholic theology of suffering to adults who have suffered childhood sexual abuse, My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints. I am very grateful to reporter John Burger and to the editors of Catholic World Report for giving me the opportunity to speak about abuse, healing, and how we as Catholics can help the wounded in our midst.

If you would like to learn more about my book and apostolate, I recommend my interviews for EWTN's "Life on the Rock" and "The Journey Home." To keep up with my upcoming speaking appearances, bookmark the "My Peace Tour" section of this blog. My e-mail address may be found here.

"A serious, profound, and beautifully written work of theology and spirituality"

Looking for my upcoming speaking dates? Scroll down or click here.

Dr. Stephen Bullivant, Senior Lecturer in Theology and Ethics at St Mary's University College, England, has written a beautiful review of My Peace I Give You that appears in the latest issue of ET-Studies, the journal of the European Society for Catholic Theology. He writes in part:

Being fortunate enough never to have experienced sexual abuse myself, I can only comment on the book as an "outsider"—albeit as an outsider who is a fellow Catholic and theologian with a personal and professional interest in this topic. Viewed from this perspective, My Peace I Give You is assuredly a serious, profound, and beautifully-written work of theology and spirituality. At its heart is the realization that the saints are our guides and examples of how to live out our lives as Christians and as human beings. The saints are, as Popes Benedict and Francis are fond of pointing out, "living translations of the gospel". Furthermore, the communion of saints is no stranger to the horrors of sexual abuse, in all its many varieties: "[A]mong those whom the Church has formally declared to be in heaven [are] people who were sexually abused as youths. [...] What surprised me was the sheer number of saints who experienced such abuse – there were many more than I had imagined – and how relevant their stories were to people living in the present day." (p. xxxi)

Some of these are, of course, very well-known. Most obvious here are those who were killed or injured resisting sexual assault, such as—in the twentieth century alone—St Maria Goretti, Bl. Alexandrina da Costa, Bl. Laura Vicuña, and Bl. Karolina Kózka. Eden makes the crucial, but all-too-often overlooked, point here that the Church rec- ognizes such heroic women as virgins even if they are in fact physically violated by their abusers, a teaching which she traces back to Augustine (p. 94). This is a very important point given the guilt and shame that survivors still often feel, even when—at an intellectual level—they recognize that they are not, and cannot be, to blame.

Weaving together the lives of the saints with a highly personal narrative of confronting her own "wounds", Eden also identifies a host of other, less obvious companions—including St Gemma Galgani, St Josephine Bakhita, Dorothy Day, St Thomas Aquinas—all of whom suffered gravely, often (but not always) from sexual abuse of one sort or another. (Her discussion of the familiar story of St Thomas and the prostitute is especially illuminating in shedding light on the various ways in which abuse can occur – pp. 158-68.) There is no space in a book review such as this to detail all the many, theologically deep and deeply moving, lessons she draws out of these. Not surprisingly, the book also possesses a rich, christological seam. Much is made, for example, of the ancient prayer Anima Christi’s entreaty: "O good Jesus, hear me, Within they wounds hide me, Suffer me not to be separated from me..." (p. xxi). Eden’s own gradual and painful journey of being drawn to Christ’s wounds, and thereby better understanding her own, is a running theme throughout the whole volume.

It is a rare book that is both theologically rich and original, and has the potential to offer significant "joys and hopes" to many of those afflicted by the darkest and most widespread "griefs and anxieties of this world" (Gaudium et Spes, 1). From my limited outsider’s perspective, My Peace I Give You might well be just such a rarity.

Listen now: I speak on "What the Saints Can Teach Us About Purification of Memory"

Thanks to the wonderful people at Jesus the Divine Word Parish in my home Archdiocese of Washington, where I had the blessing of speaking last Sunday night, you can now listen online to my talk, "What the Saints Can Teach Us About Purification of Memory." The theme is taken from my book My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints.

To see my upcoming appearances, click here. (I'll be updating that post soon, as new dates have been added.) To contact me, use the e-mail address found at the bottom of dawneden.com.

Listen now: I speak on ways to "Receive Healing Through the Wounds of Christ"

On September 21 and 22, it was my great pleasure to share the message of My Peace I Give You with nearly two thousand women at the Catholic Women's Conference in San Antonio, Texas. Click the arrow on the image below to hear an excerpt from one of the talks I gave, "Receive Healing Through the Wounds of Christ."

Clip: Dawn Eden at 2013 Catholic Women's Conference 'Receive Healing through the Wounds of Christ' by Pilgrim Center Of Hope on Mixcloud

Life in Eden—and "Life on the Rock"

Looking for my upcoming personal appearances? Click here!

With "Life on the Rock" hosts Doug Barry and Father Mark Mary, MFVA, after taping an interview for the show Aug. 15 (airing Sept. 15)

As I prepare to begin a new semester in my studies toward a sacred-theology licentiate (the last prerequisite I need before I can officially be a candidate for a sacred-theology doctorate), I would like to take a moment to thank you who have supported me in my apostolate and share with you my latest personal news:

• It was my great pleasure last week to tape an episode of EWTN's "Life on the Rock." For a full hour, Doug Barry and Father Mark Mary, MFVA, asked me about the message of My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints. I was tremendously gratified by the depth of their questions. They asked me about how those who have suffered childhood sexual abuse can heal from the effects of post-traumatic stress and find meaning in their sufferings. I was able to speak about many topics that are of central importance for victims, including understanding the difference between forgiveness and reconciliation, and what it means to find comfort through hiding within the wounds of Christ.
  
  The episode is set to air on September 15, the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows. If you would like to get a taste of it in the meantime, you can download the audio interview Father Mark Mary did with me when I visited EWTN last May to speak about My Peace on "Women of Grace."

• I wrote to you a few months ago that I was having an operation to straighten my "lazy" left eye. With the help of your prayers, the operation went very well. As you can see from the photo above, my left eye is red, but it is looking straight and is enjoying more peripheral vision than before.

• Apart from going to school, going to Mass, and spending time with friends, my favorite pastime is visiting the Jesuit cemetery at Georgetown University. I make this pilgrimage every week in honor of my beloved late mentor Father Francis Canavan, S.J. While there, I pray for Jesuit Holy Souls; for all living Jesuits, whether current or former; and for all students, faculty, and staff at Jesuit schools.
  
  
  
  
  
  At the Jesuit section of St. Louis's Calvary Cemetery, I paid my respects to Father Daniel A. Lord, S.J., Father Edward Dowling, S.J., and their companions in January 2011. Photo by Mark S. Abeln.
  
  When I visited the Georgetown Jesuit cemetery yesterday, I thought about how I have spent more than a day of my life in prayer there (and another several days walking there and back). It seemed to me that since I am visiting Georgetown University on a weekly basis anyway, it would be a good thing if I also reached out to living Jesuits, especially the old and infirm. So, this evening, I wrote to a Georgetown Jesuit I know, asking if the Jesuit infirmary might be able to use me as a volunteer. Please pray for God's will for this intention, as it would be meaningful to me to honor Father Canavan in this way, and no doubt the experience of volunteering would be personally enriching. (There are, of course, other homes for the aged in the area, and I have visited three of them, but I think I would most enjoy visiting aged Jesuits.)
  
  [Update: Just after posting this, I heard back from the Georgetown Jesuit. He thanked me for my offer, but said they had recently closed the infirmary and assisted living area of the community, so the older and infirm Jesuits are now housed in the Society's new facility in Baltimore. He also asked me to keep them in my prayers, which of course I will—please join me in that intention.]

• In terms of planning for my future and for my vocation, the most important thing to me right now is to continue studying towards a doctorate in sacred theology, in the hope that I may be a professor one day. This is important to me because it is my hope that the Lord wants to bring me vocational fulfillment as a professor. It is also important on a prudential level, because I am about to turn forty-five, am a cancer survivor, and need to get the education that will best enable me to provide for myself as the years progress. Thankfully, the Lord has given me great health, but the bout with cancer made me cognizant that I will not always be able to withstand the pace of graduate studies—plus every year I am in school means more student-loan debt. So I am working as hard as I can to complete my studies as quickly as possible, to get qualified to teach on the university level and learn what Divine Providence has in store for me next.
  
  Perhaps now you can see why I really need my visits to the Jesuit Holy Souls every week. On the one hand, many of the men buried at the Georgetown Jesuit Cemetery received advanced degrees in theology (not all; some were lay brothers or died as scholastics), and many of those received schooling far more rigorous than mine.
  
  (Which reminds me of a story Father Canavan told me about his first day of class at Duke University, where the society sent him for doctoral studies in the mid-1950s:
  
  "The young lady who was seated next to me informed me that her daddy was a vice president at General Motors.
  
  "I tried to think of an appropriate response. So I told her that I had just graduated from a school where all the courses were taught in Latin, and all the exams were given in Latin.
  
  "And she said to me, 'That is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.'")
  
  Anyway, so, on the one hand, those Jesuit Holy Souls have been there, done that, fought the good fight. I pray for them; once they get to heaven, they can cheer me on as I tread paths they trod.
  
  And on the other hand, these Holy Souls, being purified, are still in some sense bound by time—as am I. Admittedly, they are not working so much as God is working on them, but they yet have miles to go before they sleep—as do I. So we are really in this race together: they as they prepare for the visio Dei, me as I prepare for my lectio coram. We support and love one another in the Mystical Body of Christ. Blessed be God in His angels and in His saints.

• I am most grateful for your support, especially your prayers. If you would like to support me in other ways, here is my Amazon Wish List of books that I need for the fall semester. [Update, 8/19/13: What a blessing to find that readers have purchased all the books on my list! Thank you so much for your tremendous generosity! I will remember you with much gratitude as I continue my studies.]

• Know that I pray every day for everyone who has read my writings or heard me speak. That means you!

UPDATED WITH AUDIO: Welcome, "Morning Air" listeners!

UPDATE: My "Morning Air" interview is now online! Listen here.

I'm very thankful to Sean Herriott for giving me the opportunity today to speak on his Relevant Radio show "Morning Air" on how childhood sexual abuse affects men and on how those who suffered may find healing with the help of the saints.

Here are links related to topics that Sean and I discussed:

• My book for adult survivors of trauma, My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints
• An excerpt from My Peace I Give You, "St. Ignatius and Memory"
• Related articles from victims' advocacy organizations: "Common Victim Behaviors of Survivors of Sexual Abuse" and "Male Sexual Victimization Myths and Facts"
• Additional media appearances where I discuss My Peace I Give You: "Catholic Answers Live"(audio) and "Women of Grace"(video)
• The Catholic outreach for persons with same-sex attractions and their loved ones, Courage Apostolate 

Looking for my upcoming speaking appearances? You'll find them here.

Welcome, "Women of Grace" viewers!

I'm thankful that you've found my personal blog, where I post information about my speaking appearances as well as periodic updates about my life and apostolate. If you're looking to find my "Women of Grace" appearances, I have posted links to all five episodes of Feast of Eden, a blog where I post occasionally on saints and spiritual healing.

"My Peace" at Johnnette's place: Watch me on EWTN's "Women of Grace" every day, June 17-21

Just a reminder that I will be appearing on EWTN's "Women of Grace," hosted by Johnnette Benkovic, every day from this Monday, June 17, through Friday, June 21, discussing my book of Catholic spirituality for adults who have suffered childhood sex abuse, My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints. Here on the East Coast, a new episode of the show will air each day at 11 a.m., repeating at 11:30 p.m., but check EWTN's schedule for the times in your region. The website also has a live stream so that you can watch the programs online.

I would really like to get the word out to pastors about the week of My Peace coverage on "Women of Grace," so that they might let parishioners know about it. If you are a pastor, here is one way that you could mention the show in the announcements at Sunday Mass:

"We who have been joined to Christ and to our neighbor in the Eucharist at this liturgy are now called to bring the light we have received to others, particularly to those who are suffering. This week, every day from Monday through Friday, the EWTN television program 'Women of Grace' with Johnnette Benkovic is running a special series of programs on healing childhood wounds with the help of the saints. Johnnette's guest will be Dawn Eden, author of My Peace I Give You. If someone you love is a survivor of childhood trauma or abuse, these episodes of 'Women of Grace' will help you to help that person find the peace of Christ that heals all wounds. For more information on 'Women of Grace,' or to watch the show online, visit EWTN.com."

I have another special event coming up this Friday, June 21, but it will be for a more select audience. On that morning, I will bring the message of My Peace I Give You to the Riverside Correctional Facility, which is the city's jail for women. My hope is that this will be the first of many opportunities to speak to inmates about healing childhood wounds with the help of the saints, as so many people who are incarcerated have suffered abuse or trauma. I particularly want to bring the message of My Peace I Give You to male inmates, as men often feel the toxic effects of abuse more intensely than women, as they tend to carry greater misplaced shame about the evil things done to them as children.

If you would like to offer material support to bring My Peace to more victims of abuse, there is a present need: The Catholic chaplain of the Riverside Correctional Facility, Father Matthew Palkowski, O.F.M. Cap., would like to have copies of My Peace I Give You to distribute to the women under his care. If you would like to donate books, you can order them through the sales department of my publisher, Ave Maria Press, at 1-800-282-1865, ext. 1 (or via fax). Just tell them you want the copies to go to Father Palkowski and they can send them to him; they have his address.

For more information on my upcoming appearances, scroll down or click here. To see one of my previous EWTN appearances, when I shared my conversion story on "The Journey Home," click here.

Life in Eden update: Director of Dominicans' Angelic Warfare Confraternity endorses My Peace, new recorded talk available online, & more

As I prepare to leave for Birmingham, Alabama, to appear on EWTN's "Women of Grace" tomorrow at 10 a.m. Eastern time (click here for details of my upcoming talks and interviews about My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints, I have a few pieces of happy news to share:

• My Peace I Give You has been endorsed by the director of the Angelic Warfare Confraternity (an apostolate of the Dominican Friars), who urges all members to read it regardless of whether they have suffered sexual abuse. Read the endorsement and learn more about the AWC on my Patheos blog Feast of Eden.

• EWTN TV host Johnnette Benkovic has invited me to discuss My Peace I Give You on her show "Women of Grace" in a live broadcast tomorrow, May 3, from 10:00-11:00 a.m. Eastern. Not only that, but while I'm on-site, Johnnette plans to tape another two hours' worth of interviews so that she may feature me on her show for a full week, discussing not only My Peace but also my first book, The Thrill of the Chaste. Please pray for Johnette, for me, and for the viewers, that hearts may be touched.

• My April 23 interview for Sean Herriott's "Morning Air" show on Relevant Radio can be heard online (click here—the interview starts at 1:44). Sean has really put his heart and soul into outreach to adults who have suffered child abuse. He has had me discuss My Peace on his show several times, and is open with his listeners about having suffered abuse himself. I greatly admire him for the courage, depth, and persistence with which he tackles a topic that many in the media shy away from, always doing so within the light of Our Lord's healing love.

• A newly recorded talk of mine on My Peace is available online for download in podcast format (click here). I delivered the talk April 18 to TASTE, a Catholic women's lecture series in Laurel, Maryland.

• Thanks to some kind people who have donated in support of my apostolate, I have a budget to make a mission trip this summer to speak about My Peace to prison inmates or to others in particular need—e.g. Native Americans on a reservation, or people in Catholic parishes in a rural area that would not normally be able to afford to have a traveling speaker. Now all I need is to find someone who would like to book me to speak to such an audience. (I am already planning to give a talk to convicted prostitutes, which will be sponsored by a nonprofit in Philadelphia, but that will not require raiding my mission budget—only my frequent-traveler Amtrak miles.) My number one wish is to speak at the New Hampshire state prison for men, as inmate Pornchai Moontri, a convicted murderer, has written a beautiful account of how My Peace helped him find healing in Christ.

• Come July, I am looking forward to addressing the annual conference of the Courage/EnCourage Apostolate, which has invited me to speak about My Peace I Give You.

As I've mentioned, blogging is light as I am wrapping up the spring semester (I am a graduate student of theology). Please pray for me as I prepare for my comprehensive exams for the S.T.B. degree, which is a prerequisite to study for a pontifical licentiate and doctorate. Thank you and God bless you!

FREE PODCAST: My talk at Notre Dame on healing sexual wounds with the help of the saints

Today I had the joy of speaking about My Peace I Give You at the annual Edith Stein Project conference at the University of Notre Dame. Although I have given many talks about healing sexual wounds with the help of the saints, this talk marked the first time I shared the story of Blessed Laura Vicuña (left), one of the saints featured in My Peace. If you were unable to attend and would like to hear the talk, click here to download it as a podcast.

Next week, I hope to add some more dates to my online tour schedule, as I am awaiting confirmation of invitations to speak in Saskatchewan and San Antonio. In the meantime, you can click here to see my upcoming speaking dates in New York City and Denver.

Interested in saints and spiritual healing? Check out my Patheos blog, Feast of Eden.

WATCH NOW: My interview on EWTN's "Journey Home"

Looking for my upcoming speaking dates? Click here!



Here is the video of my interview on "The Journey Home" that premiered last night on EWTN, in which I share my conversion story with host Marcus Grodi and also talk about the message of my book of Catholic spirituality for adult victims of childhood sexual abuse, My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints.

I am deeply thankful to Marcus, his producer Scott Scholten, and everyone at the Coming Home Network, which produces "The Journey Home," for letting me tell my story. Thanks too to you, dear reader, if you are among those who have prayed for my apostolate. Your prayers are bearing fruit, as the message of healing sexual wounds with the help of the saints is reaching people like Marion, an EWTN viewer who left this comment on my Patheos blog:

i am so happy to know that there is a saint for sexual injured children. i watched dawn eden and felt hope. i learned there is hope for my healing at 58 years of age. i have been to many doctors and others but unless you have lived it you can never really understand.

Please keep up the prayers for Marion and for others like him, that they may find healing for their wounds through the love of all the Communion of Saints (in heaven and on earth) and the glorified wounds of the risen Christ.

Interested in saints and spiritual healing? Check out my Patheos blog, Feast of Eden.

LISTEN NOW: My Oct. 11 appearance on "Morning Air"

I had the great pleasure yesterday of speaking about healing sexual wounds with the help of the saints for a full hour on Relevant Radio's "Morning Air" with Sean Herriott. The interview is now in the "Morning Air" online archive (see the Oct. 11 listing), which enables you to either download it as a podcast or stream it live.

Sean Herriott, through his show, has been a tremendous supporter of my My Peace I Give You apostolate, and I am deeply grateful. He is a sensitive interviewer, with a profound understanding of the challenges faced by adults recovering from childhood wounds. Every time he has me on his show to discuss saints and healing, people are reached who otherwise would not have heard what Pope John Paul aptly called the Good News of redemptive suffering.

Interested in saints and spiritual healing? Check out my Patheos blog, Feast of Eden.

Photo by C. Michael Hager, taken at St. Mary Magdalene Catholic Church, Greenville, S.C., September 29, 2012.

PODCAST: My August 15 talk on My Peace now available for download

Speaking to the St. Thomas More Society of Orange County, August 15, 2012. Photo by James Doan (see more photos from the event on Flickr).
Yesterday I wrote in this space that, thanks to the good folks at St. Joseph Radio, I was able to offer a free download of the talk I gave to the St. Thomas More Society of Orange County on August 15 about my book My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints. Today I am delighted to report that, through the generous help of reader Dan, the recording has been edited so that it now qualifies as a podcast. That is to say, most of the introduction has been trimmed, along with the Q&A, plus it's now in MP3 format. So it's easy to download the recording and enjoy it during your commute, at home, or anywhere. Click here to download the podcast.

Next month I will be speaking about My Peace I Give You in New York City (at the First Things offices) and in South Carolina—click here for details and my full tour itinerary. If you would like to bring me to your parish or college, anywhere in the world, to give a talk like the one I gave August 15, drop me a line (click here to send an e-mail).

Please join me in contining prayer that the Jesus, the Divine Physician, may bring healing to all the readers of My Peace I Give You, to everyone who has heard my talks, and to all victims of trauma and abuse.

Speaking My Peace—on Cajun TV

Trista (left) and Karol (right) of the Diocese of Lafayette interview me for their cable-TV show "Catholics Today."

Here's a treat from my recent trip to Cajun country: staff members of the Diocese of Lafayette, Louisiana's Office of Pro-Life Apostolate interview me about My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints on their cable talk show "Catholics Today." It was a beautiful experience for me to talk with fellow Catholic women about the effects of childhood sexual abuse and the great resources our faith offers for healing—particularly through the lives and examples of the saints.
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Seeking your help—please click here or scroll down.

LISTEN NOW: Talking about My Peace on Catholic Broadcasting Northwest

Had a beautiful time yesterday morning speaking with Catholic Radio Northwest's Dina Marie Hale about My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints. The interview is one-hour long and is now available for download (click here).

LISTEN NOW: Pat Gohn interviews me on Among Women" podcast

Pat Gohn's latest "Among Women" podcast features an interview with me about my book My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints. You can listen to the podcast or download it from Pat's website (interview begins about 24 minutes into the show). That link will also take you to images of the windows from Georgetown University's Dahlgren Chapel of the Sacred Heart that I describe in My Peace.

Many thanks to Pat for giving me an opportunity to share my book's message. I'll soon be sharing that same message in San Diego, Los Angeles, and New York—see my latest tour itinerary.

"Reading the book is like watching Eden open a jewelry box"Patheos Book Club features My Peace

Today, readers of Patheos, one of the most popular religion websites, were introduced to my new book My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints as the book became the latest to be featured in the Patheos Book Club.

As part of the promotion, Patheos is featuring a new video interview with me (above and on the book club page) in which I talk about how, being a victim of childhood sexual abuse, I wrote My Peace I Give You to help others find the healing I found in Christ through the lives of saints who suffered such abuse.

Along with the video interview, I have a new essay on Patheos about healing sexual wounds with the help of the saints, sharing for the first time about how Blessed Laura Vicuña's witness gave me the courage to tell my own story.

Two Patheos bloggers also weighed in today on My Peace. I was so happy to read Eve Tushnet's jewelry-box analogy:

This is a very personal book. It’s the story of Eden’s own discovery of these saints and their stories, and her use of those stories in order to heal her own wounds. Reading the book is like watching Eden open a jewelry box and draw out each of her most treasured, personal, and beautiful items one by one, because she wants you to have them too.[Read Eve's full review.]

Elizabeth Scalia, a k a The Anchoress, draws parallels to physical healing:

Dawn has done something new with a subject that has been relegated to the self-help or explore-your-victimhood bookshelves for a couple of decades; she takes the deeply painful, deeply personal stuff that comes up when you dredge old demons out of the murky waters, and then treats her wounds with the antiseptic of faith and the balm of the saints, in order to bring about healing and something more: real hope for the rest of one’s life. And she shows others how to apply these remedies, too. [Read Elizabeth's full review.]

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If you are in or around New York City, I'm coming your way this Thursday night. See my "Author Events" page on Patheos for more details, and please pray for me and those I seek to help as I tour the country sharing the message of My Peace I Give You.