I recently returned from Prague, Vienna and Budapest and it was a wonderful and complex trip of political, cultural and religious history and current events. Among the highlights was a visit to Trebic in the Moravian part of the Czech Republic.

In 2003 Trebic's Jewish Quarter was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site and represents the oldest Jewish ruins outside of Israel. The first references to Jewish life in Trebic date back as far as 1338. But in the "new" synagogue, built in 1837, we found this amazing testament to a dreaming society. The prayer painted on the wall of the synagogue for all to see and to use reads, in part:

Master of the Universe: I am yours and my dreams are yours.

I dreamed a dream and do not know what it means.

May it be Your will my God and God of my ancestors that all my dreams and the dreams of the people Israel be for good, whether they be dreams regarding me or my friends or my dreams about others . . .

I am both in awe and saddened by this practice that once was, and that we've become so distant from, a practice that takes our dreams so seriously. So here's what I'm working to create: a society that treasures and values dreams, teaches dreaming to their children, works with their dreams, and through their dream work, finds Spirit and the connection to their Creator in all their dreams. And this can be done one dream at a time, one dreamer at a time. Start tonight. "I dreamed a dream . . ."

Patti Allen