Karen Dempsey

I was like, I believe in something more, but I'm not quite sure what.

So that sent me on a path.

At that point, I was already almost finished a master's in psychotherapy.

And it was psychosynthesis psychotherapy, which is a spiritual psychotherapy.

But I went from there onwards to do a two-year training in London with the One Spirit Interfaith Foundation.

seeking answers to my questions.

And I came out the other side of that and went, I still have questions.

I still don't actually have the answer.

But I was much more comfortable with my not knowing at that point.

When I set up Entheos, it was particularly around the Irish context because that was a training in the UK, which is about various faith paths.

And I realized that for me and for my contemporaries, it's not so much about the faith paths.

It's about when you step outside of a faith path,

And still hold some of that core belief and tradition in your bones.

But you don't really have anywhere to put it.

And I felt like in Ireland we were at risk of really overly polarizing that.

From all these faith paths to atheism, humanism, where there's no belief in something more.

And there was this really beautiful middle ground that nothing was really happening in.

Some things were happening, but I saw ways from my previous work.

I saw ways of making sure that we kept community at the heart of ceremony and ceremony at the heart of community.

Because I didn't want to just set up an organization that holds ceremonies.