Article December 3, 2001 Issue

Through a spiritual lens—warmth, spirit, contemplation, and joy—these outshine hate

Barbara Taylor with contributions from Peter Anderson, R. Todd Hoffman, Dana Fisher

This image of reindeer herder Vladimir Sleptsov holding his grandson, Andrei, emphasizes the theme of connection: with our own ancestors, with the family of man—and the ultimate spiritual connection with God. Here are two people who could not have been more different in age, and yet were the same.

"My blood runs through his veins," said Vladimir, an elder of the indigenous Even nomads near Chokhordakh, Russia. It was his simple explanation of the ancestral and spiritual threads that bind their lives—the song, the dance, the contemplation of the heavens on long tundra nights.

as he cuddled the baby with tenderness and reverence, they could not have been farther away from the Western World we know, both geographically and culturally. But their gestures spoke a language the world can share and understand; the bonds of love transcend boundaries of time and space, and connect us all.

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