From its outset, a library was held to be a cornerstone of the Mystery School at Findhorn, and an early member of the Community, Mary Coulman, established the first collection of books in a hut near the Caddy family’s original caravan in 1969. Two years later, the collection moved to the lovely ground-floor room of Park Building, whose bay window overlooked the magnificent cherry tree and lily pond garden. At Park Library, Connie Marcham built a collection of around 5,000 books, which, in 2000, Dina Leigh incorporated into a simple but effective cataloguing system. The library had become a ‘microcosm of the macrocosm’. A reflection and history of the interests and aspirations of the Community, with every book identifiable from the acquisition date written on the flyleaf.

I started working with Dina in 2006 and continued to focalise what had become a unique and important esoteric library after she left. When I transferred to Edinburgh (2014), Penny Johnston took charge.

Even before my departure, Penny and I had become aware of threats to the library from at least two fronts: the Findhorn Foundation, which owned the Park Building, and which needed more space for an educational office; and from dissenters, who held that paperback books – any books – were fast becoming obsolete in this ‘computer age’.

This latter view overlooked the fact that the library was beloved by many Community members, who, in addition to borrowing books, found the table by the bay window a refuge for research and contemplation when no other was available in the ecovillage. Heightened perhaps by the presence of the St Germain Sanctuary in a neighbouring room of the Park Building, the library exuded a sense of otherworldly calm and mystery. Library aficionados would report the occurrence of meaningful coincidences, such as forgetting the title they wanted to borrow only to find it staring at them from a shelf. Or, they would have no idea what they were looking for, then discover that the book in their hand was the very one to help them heal a broken heart, make compost, or meditate.

Photo by Guzel Maksutova on Unsplash

Photo by Guzel Maksutova on Unsplash

The philosopher, Arthur Koestler, named this phenomenon ‘the library angel’ through which information becomes available by way of serendipity, chance, or coincidence, rather than via a catalogue search or the internet. Certainly, the library angel was active there, in the Park Library.

The dissenters failed to appreciate that this was no ordinary library, but an esoteric and tangible reflection and history of the Findhorn Foundation Community in its widest sense. What other system or institution, Foundation or NFA, held such power?

My heart sank when sad news reached me that Penny had died prematurely and that the books which constituted the Park Library had been packed up and removed to a building in West Whins. It’s doubtful that the library angel had time to work its magic there since the new home was short-lived. The building was soon sold off as a private home, and once more the books were removed, this time to the Foundation’s bungalow, Evelyn, beside the Original Garden.

When I returned to Findhorn in 2025, a friend and I peered through Evelyn’s windows. To be sure, a few cardboard boxes were visible in an otherwise empty room. Not nearly enough to contain the library. My contacts insisted that more books must be stored in Evelyn, and hours before the denouement of The Findhorn Foundation in June 2025, I was allowed inside.

In a boxroom, I came face to face with piles of storage bags. Each bag was labelled: Astrology & Steiner, for example, and Spirituality, Carl Jung, Alice Bailey, Psychic Studies, Meditation, Relationships, etc. etc.

It was a moving moment. Like greeting old friends. Admittedly, whoever moved the collection from West Whins had been careful with their labelling. But you can’t put a library angel into a bag and label it.

Is it too late to restore this precious collection of esoterica to some semblance of its former importance? I cannot say, but some NFA members envision the establishment of a museum and library when suitable premises are found. It will require sensitive curation to select from the storage bags a collection, with new additions, that reflects the Community from its origins in 1962 to the present. No longer the cornerstone of the former Mystery School, but a touchstone for that which is coming.