CÚIG GHRIANGHRAF-IRELAND Day 18

Today is the 25th anniversary of our Ceremony of Union at the Brunswick Unitarian Universalist Church in Maine. We remain grateful for a spiritual community that recognized our relationship as legitimate well before our government did. I'm grateful to have Jim C by my side for nearly 29 years.

We prepared to leave Donegal today after breakfast. As I was thanking Theresa and Patricia, for the lovely stay, they launched into personal stories about being "saved". I knew from a conversation the day before that Patricia had met and married her minister husband about four years ago, and that he was from California.

I'm assuming that Theresa and Patricia shared their stories as testimony of how their spiritual journey had saved their lives. At first, I wanted to quickly extricate myself from the conversation. I have generally felt verbally assaulted by conservative Christians who too often cherry pick the bible and make sure to let me know that anyone who doesn't join them is going to burn in the fiery depths of Hell, particularly the likes of the "God Hates Fags" signs that I've walked by in Pride Parades. Instead I told them after listening to their stories, that I was happy that they had chosen a path for them that gave them fulfillment and hope, and that we were all trying to figure that out.

I told them that the U.S. was very divided on these ideas and that the fracture was causing much heartache back home. Patricia told me that most people in Ireland had seen America as the "light on the hill" and that it was viewed as a place of openness, diversity and freedom. I told her that I hoped that we would live up to those principles soon. I didn't tell her that I thought it was a bit of a myth that we have ever lived up to that ideal. I gave both of the women hugs and thanked them for the conversation and their hospitality.

I am giving this conversation much attention in today's thoughts because I think it's important to find ways to have dialogue with people when we don't view the world from the same perspective. For the next several days, we're off to Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom that is divided from the Republic of Ireland. For many years Northern Ireland experienced "The Troubles" a euphemistic caption for the violent division between Protestants and Catholics.

Enroute to Derry-Londonderry we took a detour to the Marble Arch Caves. The tour was quite spectacular as the formations were impressive as well as the story of explorers who first discovered the cave.

We made our way to the city of Derry/Londonderry which continues to have a naming dispute depending on the perspective of the people. The Irish Nationalists prefer Derry and the Unionists prefer Londonderry. We will be going to explore the history of the city and the area over the next several days.

For now, I can tell you that this beautiful walled city sits on the Foyle River. It is the setting of the popular show "The Derry Girls" which portrays living in the area during the latter part of "The Troubles".

We enjoyed dinner, a stop at a few pubs and a walk across the Peace Bridge, a symbol of breaking down the divisions in the city.

We are staying at a nice B&B on the outskirts of town. We settled in for the night, and we're looking forward to learning about this city.Read more