The first thing I understand is mystery, and I move to the great deserts of the Middle East,

and I realize that the God of Abraham, who is the God of the Jew, the Christian, and the Muslim,

revealed himself in the desert. God intrudes in a moment. He revealed himself that day,

that moment. Well, he also reveals himself in that place. Well, what is that place? It is sand.

After September 11th, Richard Rodriguez traveled to the Middle East to explore his kinship

as a Roman Catholic, with the men who stepped onto airplanes and turned them into weapons of terror.

What he learned illuminates some of the deepest paradox and promise of the world we inhabit.

He is an especially intriguing conversation partner for right now, a life and mind,

straddling, left and right, religious and secular, immigrant and intellectual.

In this second episode in our American Consciousness series, we mine his wisdom on the emerging

fabric of human identity. I'm Christopher Tippet, and this is on being.

Richard Rodriguez is an acclaimed writer, best known to many for his years of commentary on the

PBS NewsHour. He was born in Sacramento, California, the first generation child of Mexican immigrant

parents. His lyrical writing embodies the way particular human experience,

articulately recorded, can reveal deep truths about what is enduringly human and universally

animating. His books include Hunger of Memory, Brown, The Last Discovery of America,

and in 2013, Darling, a spiritual autobiography. We spoke in the outdoor hall of philosophy

at the Chautauqua institution in upstate New York.

So I start every one of my conversations, whether I'm with a quantum physicist or a journalist

with this question, which is a question you've explored in great depths in your writing. Would

you tell us about the religious and spiritual background of your childhood?

It was total. I grew up Roman Catholic, though that doesn't even do it justice. I grew up in

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