Thin Places: An Evangelical Journey into Celtic Christianity

If you missed the first article in this series, let's explain it again. A thin place is a metaphor of Celtic Christian origins. In this tradition, a thin place is a place where humans experience God's physical location more directly. This metaphor assumes a world view that heaven and earth are generally far apart. However, as the gap between the heavens and the earth is narrowing, some areas of the earth seem thin. It is therefore easier for people to feel God's presence in so-called weak places.

I may have heard that it is used 500 times or more since I first touched the phrase "thin place". In some Christian world, Celtic Christianity has become very popular, so we use "weak places" to explain where people experience God. I tend to resist this language. Part of that reason is obsolete, in part it is uncomfortable in that meaning. Ironically, with the irony of God's sovereignty, I worked in places where people prefer to be regarded as thin. For the past four and a half years I have worked at Laity Lodge, a leisure center in the hills of Texas. I heard that Laity Lodge is described as a thin place that could be over a hundred times more. When people say this, they mean praise Laity Lodge as a rare place to promote an intimate relationship with God. For them, at Laity Lodge, the gap between Earth and Heaven seems to be very small.