Editor’s Note:

Katherine Collis wrote a three-part feature about Iona and the retreat house Traigh Bhan. These three articles were split across various editions of the Community magazine Network News. This first part, re-created below, is taken from Network News No 15, which was published in April 1998. 

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The tiny Hebridean island of Iona has for centuries been regarded as a place of immense spiritual power and beauty and Scotland’s most holy island. In 1972 we were bequeathed a home on the island called Traigh Bhan (White Strand). In the house was a room consecrated as a planetary sanctuary dedicated to the spirit of the New, whose peace, clarity and presence had already drawn many. Thus the Isle of Iona became integrally linked to the life of the Findhorn Foundation and over the past 26 years thousands of Foundation members and guests have been arriving on Iona’s quay side and quietly using the house for retreat, renewal and inspiration, helping link different centres, places and people in the wider network of light. Within the Foundation the focus for Iona and care of Traigh Bhan is well held by the Iona group.

Iona is dear to my heart and five years ago I took part in a workshop there with Findhorn Foundation Fellow Katherine Collis which marked a personal turning point in my life. When prompted by the Angel of Findhorn to include a story on Iona I turned to Katherine who has responded so beautifully and wisely.

When our dear editor, Michael Hawkins, first asked me to write a piece on the Isle of Iona, I wasn’t sure where to begin. My husband Roger and I, after all, are so called ex-Findhorn members, and left the Foundation in 1973. Michael pointed out that due to our long-standing relationship with both Findhorn and Iona, our personal story would be of interest and educational, especially from a perspective representing the wider world family. Michael also confessed he got shivers down his spine when reading the title of our upcoming Iona workshop entitled “Summoning the Possible”, in the Foundation brochure. The moment he shared that with me it dawned on me that these words, “summoning the possible”, are the best I know to describe the way the heart of Iona reaches out and stirs so many of us.

In fairness, in order to honour Iona and its relationship to both Findhorn and the wider world community, we thought it best to approach Iona’s “story” in parts. In other words there is simply too much I wish to say, so in this issue we begin a trilogy of articles that explore Iona’s unique spiritual power, importance and relevance today.

My own history with Iona began in California in 1968 when, as a teenager, I had a very vivid dream. As I was flying over the earth I came upon an island that held a sacred destiny, an ancient place, whose heart formed long ago during the original seeding of our planet: its stone holding an imprint of the destiny of our world. Whenever periods of change, turmoil or darkness fell upon the surrounding land and sea, the island would wake, becoming as a beacon, radiating a great light from deep within.

Eventually over time, a school grew on the island, a place that gathered the essential knowledge of the past but also stored the means to ascertain the future, instilling visions of what was yet to come. Here pilgrims were drawn from far away places to be taught, trained and prepared for what they needed in order to go forth again, carrying the spirit of the island with them, seeding its light in many places, until stability once again reigned over the land.

I was then shown the world during my lifetime. An ominous life-threatening darkness now enveloped the whole globe, a planet in the midst of profound transition, instability and threat. I watched as once again the island came to life, the school became active and individuals began to be drawn from all corners of the world. Vision after vision, light after light, they came and went until eventually the whole earth was seeded with light, shining itself as the beacon, its radiance emanating out through the vast reaches of the universe and oceans of space.

This vision, no doubt symbolic of some archetypal state within the realm of the deeper Self and World Soul, nonetheless convinced me such a place might exist. My search eventually led me to Britain where on a flight to London I happened to sit next to a young anthroposophist from Colombia, named Amalia with whom I formed an instant and mutual rapport. Somewhere out over the Atlantic Ocean, while peering into the night sky, she pointed to a star shining brightly in the darkness.

“Perhaps we originally hail from that star out there, an island star in the sea of the cosmos, an island like the Isle of Iona.”

Not only did Amalia tell me all about Iona but she also happened to know Roger, then a student at Emerson College in England, who had coincidentally visited Iona at the time of my dream. What followed was an intricate weaving of my own spiritual search, to Findhorn, to Iona, to my partnership with Roger, and through Roger to befriending a lovely, elderly woman on Iona, Jessica Ferreira known for her sanctuary at Traigh Bhan. When Roger and I married, Jessica asked if we would carry on the work of the sanctuary and Traigh Bhan, and at our request, she instead generously gifted her house to the Findhorn Trust into the hands of collective custodianship. So began an ongoing love affair with Iona and Traigh Bhan that has continued to this day, a love that belongs to many.

For twenty seven years it has been part of our journey to return again and again to Iona, to “listen” at her shores to what she has to say. Over this time she has seen our family through many stages of life, from bringing Roger and me together, to the birth and death of children, to decisions about moves and work, and always, in our deepening relationship to spirit and our ability to respond to the call of the world.

At moments I considered titling this article, “Darshan With An Island” (the transmission of energy from a spiritual teacher to his/her student), for Iona’s spirit undoubtedly models and transmits something that has a subtle yet profound effect on people. Granted, Iona is only one of many special sites in the planetary village and is definitely not for everyone, nor do I wish to unduly romanticise any such place. In fact, at times, during the height of tourist season all one may encounter is a weary worn, over crofted little island. Yet beyond the surface there is a combination of qualities I have not found anywhere else, a sense of peace, grace, and freedom; of eternalness and homecoming; mixed with sharp clarity and a gentle “strip to the core” healing power.

There is no longer a “school” on the island, at least in the way I may have expected due to my dream, but there is a tangible presence of the sacred and apprehensible field of wisdom. The landscape and wild elements, the sea and ancient stone, the deep peace and depth of silence, the memories and legends, the islanders and creatures, are all windows into Iona’s spirit and how she works.

Indeed, leading retreats over the years, I have seen Iona work its magic within people’s lives and, like so many others, have wondered at the mystery of the place, seeking to understand what it is that is so renewing, healing, and inspiring about this windswept out-cropping of old stone. Yet this is part of her secret. There is no doubt in my mind that much of lona’s power comes from the fact that the island is made up of some of the oldest rock on the earth’s surface. These rocks, recently dated as far back as 2.3 billion years, are so old that they hold no record of fossilised life.

Traigh Bhan Visitor Guide 2019 p14

Over the centuries Iona has been called by different names, “the Isle of Dreams”, “the Isle of Standing Stones”, and since Christian conversion, “the Isle of the Holy Spirit”, though by some accounts the earliest known name of the island is Iona, “Goddess of the Sea”, a primal figure in the Celtic pantheon of gods and goddesses, suggesting a more ancient pre-Druid history.

On this history we can but speculate, although by most archaeological accounts it seems the island’s primary purpose was that of a burial spot. In Celtic tradition such places were considered as gateways into the other world, and even to this day it is said that on Iona “the veils between the worlds are thin”. Likewise it is told that kings and chiefs of old, came to the island to take their oaths on the Black Stones of Destiny. According to some legends, the famous Coronation Stone at Westminster Abbey, recently returned to Scotland, is one of these. Brigit, Mary of the Gael, is also associated with Iona. Originally the Celtic Goddess of Spring, ruler of healing, inspiration and learning, she is later to be found in the historical figure of St Brigit or Bride, one of the pillars of the Celtic Church. Brigit speaks to the strong feminine qualities of the island, though history books only mention women’s role on Iona as beginning with the 12th century Benedictine nunnery. Here, it is said that women kept silent vigil for the world for three hundred years. Who knows the work of those women whose bones have recently been unearthed under the nunnery’s chapel, bones which date back to a yet undetermined time BC.

In 563 AD, an Irish monk named Columcille (later called Columba), arrived on Iona and founded the historic Celtic Christian order and school. Already a revered teacher, Columba had founded over 40 other monastic communities before being exiled from Ireland, guilty of perhaps one of the first recorded cases of plagiarism, an act worthy of death or banishment.

Columba and the scholar priests who followed, made Iona a stronghold of Celtic Christianity for four centuries, influencing the formation of 96 other centres throughout Europe.

These early schools and monastic settlements were “unprecedented hubs of prosperity, art and learning” which balanced the contemplative life with the affairs of the world. The study of language, literacy and the art of illumination (the creation of manuscripts) were central to these communities, along with community skills of farming, healing and householding. As Philip Newell, recent warden of Iona Abbey, writes in his book, Listening For The Heartbeat of God, “the Celtic Christian Mission inspired by John, remembered him as the beloved disciple who leaned against Jesus at the Last Supper. He had become an image of listening for the heartbeat of God. This Celtic spirituality lent itself to listen for God at the heart of life.”

In grasping the consciousness of these earlier brothers and sisters one can sense the threads of relatedness between their spiritual life and what we also aspire to in our time. It was a life rooted in earth, in nature, in the relationship with the visible and invisible, the human and angelic, and at the core, the journey of deepening into the heart – the immediacy and intimacy of God’s nature and presence.

This understanding was also based on recognising our innate human capacity to be in communion and communication with the Divine, which speaks directly to the refined practice of inner listening, attunement to God, and cooperation with spirit, which was at the core of Eileen’s, Peter’s and Dorothy’s earlier training, crucial to Findhorn’s formation.

So we touch on the link between Iona and Findhorn, the significance of which highlights one of the spiritual streams upon which Findhorn was founded. This stream flows from the Celtic world, woven through Scotland’s history, grounded in the very land itself, a land which holds memory of Celtic wisdom, as well as the lineage of spiritual community epitomised by the early Irish spiritual centres.

The seeds of what were planted long ago are what we are continuing to evolve now  – an approach to living, rooted in an experience of God present in all creation, neither divorced from everyday life nor from our own nature. The spiritual practice – a listening for the goodness in each, and for God in all things, recognising that when we act on behalf of that Love we are part of the Divine in expression, the continued unfolding of creation.

Katherine Collis photo Terry Duffy

Katherine Collis. Photo by Terry Duffy.

It is this experience of the love of creation which is profoundly awakened in many who visit Iona. If that is all, it is enough. Yet as I walk Iona’s shores I am aware that the needs of our world call forth something more. The world in turmoil during Columba’s time needed certain teachings, disciplines, skills and actions. If Iona again has a way to help meet what is relevant to our moment in history, what is it?

It has taken me years to understand that what Iona teaches now is different, for the need is different. It is no mistake that there is no outer structure or school and that what is on Iona is invisible, for it points to the very domain where our answers now lie and of what we each must learn. It is the language, literacy and illumination of the soul. The Soul, whose time has come to be brought forth into the world.

Katherine Collis

“Be thou a bright flame before us
Be thou a guiding star above us
Be thou a smooth path below us
Be thou a kindly shepherd behind us
Be thou – today, tonight and forever”

Prayer of St Colomba

 

Read more of this three-part feature:

Iona: Summoning The Possible Part 2

Iona: Summoning The Possible Part 3