"O God, thou art my Mother and I am thy child," the great Hindu seer Ramakrishna once noted, "this is the last word in spirituality." According to Andrew Harvey, the author of more than 30 books including The Direct Path, the influence of the patriarchy in all the world's religions has kept this huge secret from all of us. With his usual distinctive blend of erudition and enthusiasm, the author unspools ample evidence of the Sacred Feminine in Hinduism, Buddhism, Sufism, Taoism, Christianity, and the primal traditions.

We appreciate Harvey's succinct overview of the unique contributions of Ramakrishna and Sri Aurobindo to our understanding of the Mother's omnipresence, magnificence, and glory. He affirms and celebrates Sufism's "vision of the glory and majesty of every soul and of the necessity of the path of adoration as the swiftest and most authentic way to God." He is impressed with Buddhism's emphasis upon compassion and the Taoist "sense of the continuing poetry of the divinity of the ordinary."

Based on a series of lectures given at the California Institute of Integral Studies in 1994, many of the chapters close with a series of questions and answers where Harvey speaks forthrightly about the end of the guru system, the mystical power of love, the spiritual practice of adoration, tantric sexuality, and much more.

The presence and vitality of the Sacred Feminine provides the fuel for what Harvey calls "the five sacred passions" that can transform our individual lives and provide a healing balm for nature, the body, sexuality, and the suffering and pain of the poor and the oppressed. At one point, the author challenges us to "keep a river of prayer in your heart." Fine advice and fitting given all that the Mother has nurtured within us.