I am a hospice and palliative care physician and was moved by this program enough to buy Kate's book for myself and a friend. In my daily spiritual journey I have found (and often teach) that our "presence" and listening at times of personal loss is more potent and meaningful than any medicine which can be prescribed. Chaplain Braestrup brings this lesson alive for everyone. It also reinforces our connectedness with others which transcends religion (in my opinion). I am grateful to you for featuring this special person on your show.

As a former police chaplain (Detroit PD, sworn in 1975, currently retired member ICPC), it is important to note positively that Ms. Braestrup, having been married to a state trooper, was already behind the "blue curtain." Few police/law enforcement chaplains have that advantage. That doesn't guarantee acceptance, but it helps.

That she comes from a liberal tradition puts her in the minority of chaplains — whether hospice, health care, law enforcement. Many chaplains come from within the conservative/fundamentalist Protestant tradition. (Only recently a seminar was held in Michigan for hospice chaplains on how to effect death-bed conversions).

As Kate described the love of the guys working to bring home bodies and deliver a mete of justice in tragically hopeless situations, I heard solid echoes of Marianne Pearl's interview and the gratitude she felt to the relentless Pakistani officers that brought home her husband's body. The breastfeeding detective mama and the diligent "Capitan" in Karachi — comrades in doing work that is difficult and necessary and hard and also full of love. Thank you so much for this interview and the stories that are so particular, yet also, somehow universal.

I have to say this program moved me more then any Speaking of Faith program I've ever heard. For the first time someone articulated a belief system that validates what I believe. I am an atheist but a very devoted spiritually oriented person and have given much thought to these issues. When I was telling my husband about the program I was moved to tears. Thank you for this wonderful interview, Krista. It meant a lot to me. I am telling all my friends and family about this particular show. I've told them all about the show already, and my friends and I sometimes discuss the programs and sometimes listen together. This show, however, is the most meaningful to me.

Don't get me wrong, I love the diversity of voices on SOF, but I have been waiting for an UU voice to be interviewed on this show. I almost always hear things that resonate in my soul on SOF. Some of the things that Ms. Braestrup said reached into the core of what I believe. She gave a voice and words to things that I feel and have struggled to articulate.

I don't know about the existence of God, but it doesn't matter. I am pretty sure we only have one life to live, but it doesn't matter. What matters is love — finding love, understanding the many facets of love, and connecting with other human beings. It doesn't really matter how we do it. I do it in teaching, performing, and creating music. That is my ministry. Ms. Braestrup gives a wonderful example of how to live in the present, to find and share heaven with others in this life.

Thank you so very much for bringing us an interview with Kate Braestrup. She is another extremely beautiful gift to us — her wisdom and solemn knowing about life reached a new depth of helping us all see the details of the kingdom — and how we all cherish you Krista for appreciating someone like Kate — and bringing us her story — blessing us greatly!

I wish Kate lived in the Midwest so I could get to know her better. She is a great representative of the UU spirit. I look forward to reading the book. Having worked around law enforcement for a number of years, I can relate to being the only woman in a group of men who are reluctant to show their softer side in public. What a great job you have, despite the heartache.

First, I want to say I look forward every week to hearing this program and admire the job Krista does in researching and interviewing each week's participant(s). I am grateful that a forum like this exists and for the hard work of everyone involved in bringing it to the air. This week's show with Kate Braestrup is the first one so far that I have listened to both in the edited and unedited versions just to hear not only everything Kate and Krista had to say to each other but how the show was polished up and put together by the producers with music and narration. Beautiful job!

I have read Here If You Need Me already and our local book club is going to discuss it in soon (on my recommendation). I cried and was moved many times while reading and again when listening to the broadcast. I especially identified with the practical bent of Kate's religious beliefs — what I can see and feel and experience is what is real and what shows God's existence. I too don't know about heaven and hell in the abstract sense of both those words but do know viscerally the "hell" of suffering in the here and now and the heaven of feeling love/loved in my every day life.

I was recently visiting a good friend (whom I don't visit often enough), and in the middle of chatting and being entertained by her 5-year-old, she noticed me scanning her bookshelves. She pulled down a book and handed it to me, informing me that it was written by her husband's first girlfriend (true!), and said, "You need to read this. It's beautiful, and it will really speak to you." I looked it over and told her thanks, but having a few books I'm already reading I politely declined.

Well, here I am three days later, having listened intently to the marvelous "Presence in the Wild" interview with Kate Braestrup, and I see on the SOF Web site the cover of that very same book. I just called my friend and said, "I guess I need to read that book."

I am a new listener to the broadcast and I wanted to thank you for such a wonderful and thought-provoking production. After listening to the show, I downloaded the unedited version. I really enjoyed hearing the way things are prepared before the beautiful music and editing are introduced. It was as if I were there in studio. Thank you for posting that look behind the curtain. It was a great interview with a great person.

This Sunday morning, I listened to "Presence in the Wild" and felt so renewed, so — perhaps, religious not spiritual— Thank you. I will stop and look the next time I pass the Memorial in Washington at Judiciary Square. The people of Maine are so blessed.

Braestrup's words, more than any I've heard in the past few years, touched me deep inside. Her ideas about heaven and hell, life and death and being held in love moved me more than others and rang so true and made miracles real for the first time in my life. I've always said, as so many other seekers, that I'm spiritual but not religious. I stand corrected and now see my own religious underpinnings.