September 1, 2023

EPHRATA

Today I arrived in a new place:

Ephrata, Pennsylvania.

New life, a new place to live.

It's from the word, "Ephrath".

That's the Syriac, Aramaic, Hebrew

name for Bethlehem where Jesus was born.

What will, what can, what hope 

do I have for this interesting name

of a place in Lancaster County, PA?

Our religious community, the Redemptorists,

came here in 1914.

Ephrata was started by another religious community,

a semimonastic order of male and female 

Seven Day Dunkers - back in 1732.

It's now a town of about 14,000 people.

Interesting! We'll see. What's next?

(c) Reflections, Andy Costello

September 1, 2023