Carol Lee Flinders

Carol Lee Flinders (née Ramage; born 1943) is a writer, independent scholar, educator, speaker, and former syndicated columnist. She received a doctorate in comparative literature from the University of California, Berkeley, with a focus on medieval women's mysticism. She is currently faculty at the Sophia Center for Culture and Spirituality at Holy Names College in Oakland, California, where she teaches courses on mysticism and contemplative spirituality.^[3] She is also a Fellow at Santa Clara University.^[3] In the past, Flinders taught at the University of California at Berkeley, the Graduate Theological Union, and elsewhere. Her published writings cover a variety of topics ranging from medieval Christian mysticism to vegetarian cooking to scientific research on meditation. She is a coauthor of Laurel's Kitchen (1976) and its later editions, which in all sold more than a million copies. From 1977 through 1989 she wrote a widely syndicated column on vegetarian cooking. Notes from Laurel's Kitchen.

She is married to Timothy Flinders, and is mother of screenwriter and filmmaker Mesh Flinders.^[1]

Biography

Flinders (birth name Ramage) was born in Portland, Oregon, on 12 December 1943^[1][2] to Gilbert H. and Jeanne Lee Ramage.^[1][4] As a child, she grew up on a farm in Oregon's Willamette Valley.^[5] In 1958 her family moved to Spokane.^[4]:F1 She graduated from North Central High School (Spokane, Washington) in 1961,^[6] later receiving a bachelor's degree from Stanford University (1965), and a PhD in comparative literature, with a focus on medieval women's mysticism,^[7] from the University of California at Berkeley (1973).^[1] She married her husband Timothy Flinders in 1971.^[8] They live at a spiritual community in northern California.^[1]

Flinders became nationally known in 1976 through her coauthorship of Laurel's Kitchen, a widely acclaimed guide to vegetarian cookery that has been described as a "renowned countercultural cookbook,"^[9]:417 and as "the Fannie Farmer of vegetarian cooking."^[10]:142 It sold more than a million copies,^[5] and cultural historians later contended that "Laurel's Kitchen was as much a lifestyle guide as it was a cookbook."^[11]:153 Following the success of Laurel's Kitchen, Flinders began writing a weekly newspaper column that in 1987 was syndicated by 20 newspapers across the US, including the Washington Post and others.^[4] She continued writing this column for 12 years, until 1989. During this period she gave birth to one child, Ramesh Flinders.^[4]

Turn to spiritual themes

Beginning in the late 1980s, Flinders published a series of books on spirituality. The first, entitled The Making of a Teacher (1989), was coauthored with her husband Timothy Flinders. It provided an oral history of the life and work of spiritual teacher Eknath Easwaran, who had helped inspire the creation of Laurel's Kitchen, and who in 1968 at U.C. Berkeley had taught what was believed to be the first accredited course on meditation at a Western university.^[12]

Four years later, in 1993, Flinders published Enduring Grace: Living Portraits of Seven Women Mystics, a well-received collection of spiritual portraits of 7 Catholic mystics, 5 of them canonized as saints: Claire of Assisi, Mechtilde of Magdeburg, Julian of Norwich, Catherine of Siena, Catherine of Genoa, Teresa of Avila, and Therese of Lisieux.^[13]

Several additional books by Flinders have focused on various intersections of feminism, spirituality, and cultural and biological evolution. At the Root of this Longing: Reconciling a Spiritual Hunger and a Feminist Thirst (1998) chronicles her struggle to reconcile the claims of a lifelong meditation practice with her emerging feminism. The book argues that both feminism and contemplative spirituality represent authentic, and complimentary searches for truth.^[14] In Rebalancing the World (2003) she explores the historical and anthropological dimensions of the gender divide, and suggests ways that contemporary movements can restore an ancient harmony between the sexes.^[15]

In Enduring Lives: Portraits of Women and Faith in Action (2006), a "sister volume"^[16] to Enduring Grace, Flinders raises questions such as: What would Saint Teresa of Avila or Saint Clare of Assisi do today? She examines the lives of four contemporary women spiritual activists: Jane Goodall, the primatologist and environmentalist; Etty Hillesum, the young Jewish mystic-philosopher murdered at Auschwitz; Jetsumna Tenzin Palmo, the Tibetan Buddhist teacher; and Catholic death-penalty activist Sister Helen Prejean.^[17]

Flinders is now faculty at the Sophia Center for Culture and Spirituality at Holy Names College in Oakland, California, where she teaches courses on mysticism and contemplative spirituality. She is also a Fellow at the Spirituality and Health Institute at Santa Clara University.^[3] In the past, Flinders has taught mystical literature at the University of California at Berkeley, and has taught at the Graduate Theological Union, and elsewhere.^[3][18]

Flinders has been interviewed and profiled numerous times in the media (see below).^{[5][6][19][20]} In the 2000s, with her husband and others, she coauthored several reviews of scientific studies of the passage meditation program (see below).^[21][22][23] Between 1984 and the 2000s, she also continued to contribute as a coauthor to additional books related to Laurel's Kitchen (see below).^[24]

Works

Books on spirituality &/or feminism

Flinders has authored or co-authored books on spirituality and/or feminism that include^[25]

• Flinders, Carol (1993). Enduring grace: Living Portraits of Seven Women Mystics. San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco. ISBN 0062502840. 

• Flinders, Carol (1995). A Little Book of Women Mystics. San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco. ISBN 0060626852. 

• Flinders, Carol (1998). At the root of this longing: Reconciling a spiritual hunger and a feminist thirst. San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco. ISBN 0062513141.  ISBN 006251315X
• Flinders, Carol (2003). Rebalancing the world: Why women belong and men compete and how to restore the ancient equilibrium. HarperCollins. ISBN 9780062517371. 

• Originally published as: Flinders, Carol (2002). The values of belonging: Rediscovering balance, mutuality, intuition, and wholeness in a competitive world. San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco. ISBN 0062517368. 

• Flinders, Carol (2006). Enduring Lives: Portraits of Women and Faith in Action. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin. ISBN 9781585424962.  ISBN 158542496X
• Flinders, Tim; Carol Flinders (1989). The Making of a Teacher: Conversations with Eknath Easwaran. Petaluma, CA: Nilgiri Press. ISBN 9780915132546. OCLC 18983479.  ISBN 0915132540 (191 pages).

• Flinders, Tim; Carol Flinders (2002). The Making of a Teacher: Conversations with Eknath Easwaran. New Delhi, India: Penguin India. ISBN 9780143028338.  ISBN 0143028332 (191 pages).

Books on vegetarian cooking

Flinders' coauthored books on vegetarian cooking^[26] include

• Robertson, Laurel; Carol Flinders; Brian Ruppenthal (1986). The New Laurel's Kitchen: A Handbook for Vegetarian Cookery & Nutrition. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press. ISBN 0898151678.  ISBN 089815166X

• Robertson, Laurel; Carol Flinders; Bronwen Godfrey (1976). Laurel's Kitchen: A Handbook for Vegetarian Cookery & Nutrition. Berkeley, CA: Nilgiri Press. ISBN 0915132079. 

• Robertson, Laurel; Carol Flinders; Bronwen Godfrey (2003). The Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book: A Guide to Whole-Grain Breadmaking. New York: Random House. ISBN 0812969677. 

• Robertson, Laurel; Carol Flinders; Bronwen Godfrey (1984). The Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book: A Guide to Whole-Grain Breadmaking. New York: Random House. ISBN 0394537009. 

• Robertson, Laurel; Carol Flinders; Brian Ruppenthal (1993). Laurel's Kitchen Recipes. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press. ISBN 0898155371. 
• Robertson, Laurel; Carol Flinders; Brian Ruppenthal (1997). Laurel's Kitchen Caring: Recipes for Everyday Home Caregiving. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press. ISBN 0898159512. 

Chapters

Flinders has authored or coauthored several chapters in edited books, on topics that include meditation, spirituality, and feminism.^[27] She contributed a chapter to Women, Spirituality, and Transformative Leadership (2012), which won a Nautilus Book Award,^[28] and was recognized by Booklist as one of the "Top 10 Religion & Spirituality Books" of 2012.^[29] Flinders' chapters include:

• Tim Flinders, Doug Oman, and Carol Flinders (2007). The eight-point program of passage meditation: Health effects of a comprehensive program. In Thomas G. Plante, & Carl E. Thoresen (Eds.), Spirit, science and health: How the spiritual mind fuels physical wellness (pp. 72–93). Westport, CT: Praeger. ISBN 978-0-275-99506-5
• Tim Flinders, Doug Oman, and Carol Flinders (2009). Meditation as Empowerment for Healing. In J. Harold Ellens (Ed.), The Healing Power of Spirituality (Vol. I, pp. 213–240). Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger. ISBN 978-0-313-36645-1
• Tim Flinders, Doug Oman, Carol Flinders, and Diane Dreher (2010). Translating Spiritual Ideals into Daily Life: The Eight Point Program of Passage Meditation. In Thomas G. Plante (Ed.), Contemplative Practices in Action: Spirituality, Meditation, and Health (foreword by Huston Smith) (pp. 35–59). Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger. ISBN 978-0-313-38256-7
• Carol Flinders (2012). Mother-lines of body, mind, and spirit. In Kathe Schaaf, Kay Lindahl, Kathleen S. Hurty, Guo Cheen (Eds.), Women, spirituality, and transformative leadership: Where grace meets power^[28][29] (pp. 145–150). Woodstock, VT: SkyLight Paths. ISBN 9781594733130

Syndicated column

Flinders published a syndicated newspaper column from 197 through 1989, focused on vegetarian cookery. Entitled Notes from Laurel's Kitchen, it appeared in 20 newspapers in 1987.^[4] The column was published in newspapers that ranged from The Washington Post,^[30] to The Spokesman-Review (Spokane, WA),^[31] The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR),^[32] and the Milwaukee Journal (Milwaukee, WI),^[4][33]

Interviews and profiles

At different times in her career, Flinders has been interviewed or profiled by several periodicals, including Yoga Journal,^[34] the Marin Independent Journal, The Salt Lake Tribune, the Spokane Chronicle, and The Spokesman Review (Spokane):

• Linda Johnsen (1998). "Compassion born of rage [interview with Carol Flinders and China Galland]". Yoga Journal 143 (143, Nov/Dec, 1998): 68–75, 135–138. ISSN 0191-0965. 

• Maura Thurman (August 8, 2006). "Taking a New Path: 'Laurel's Kitchen' Co-Author Writes about Feminism, Spirituality". Marin Independent Journal. ISSN 0891-5164. OCLC 61313188. 

• Hilary Groutage (March 14, 1998). "Feminism, spiritual life merge; for author, one idea strengthens the other; author mixes feminism, spirituality [profile of Carol Flinders]". The Salt Lake Tribune. pp. C1 (Religion section). ISSN 0746-3502. OCLC 137343114. 

• Dan Webster (March 5, 1998). "Klaas case bolsters Flinders' theory". The Spokesman Review. pp. D1 (In Life section). OCLC 11102529. 

• Jamie Neely (September 15, 1987). "Author pursues spiritual goals in 'laurel's kitchen'". Spokane Chronicle. pp. F1. OCLC 17365219. Retrieved 21 Oct 2012. 

Flinders' impact has sometimes been mentioned in writings by others. Actress Ashley Judd has referred to Flinders as a "mentor."^[35]

Excerpts

Flinders work was excerpted in Sacred Voices, a 2002 book edited by Ford-Grabowsky:^[36]

• Carol Flinders (2002). Mary Ford-Grabowsky, ed. "Our Daughters, Our Selves". Sacred Voices: Essential Women's Wisdom Through the Ages (San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco): 266–268.  (Excerpt from At the Root of this Longing)

References

• Personal website