I am an Army brat, brought up on Army Posts all over the world where the closest thing to religion was the non-denominational chapel on whatever Army base we happened to be near. I announced to my parents when I was 13 that I was an atheist. And I was a committed atheist all of my life. My view was that more evil had been done in the name of religion than anything else in the world.I saw no redeeming value in it at all. Then I met Jon Meacham and we began talking.

No, Jon didn't convert me, but he did convince me that religion was not a subject to be dismissed or disdained. I began reading and studying and talking to people about religion and spirituality with Jon as my guide. My reaction to what I learned was threefold. First, I was embarrassed that I had shrugged off a subject that was so important to so many people in the world, particularly since I was a reporter of politics and culture. Secondly, I was amazed at how fascinating and exciting the study of religion was -- and the more I learned, the more immersed in it I became. Third, I was moved by the yearning for something beyond oneself that drew so many people, even the doubters, to search for faith, especially after 9/11.

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I am sitting here looking at a beautiful picture of my family. My husband and son, my parents, my brother and sister and her family. We are all smiling. We are clearly having a wonderful time. We are sitting at the Thanksgiving table 13 years ago. The candles are glowing, the plates are empty, the wine glasses refilled. You can almost feel the joy emanating from the photograph. It was, my father said that day, “the happiest Thanksgiving our family has ever had. I’ve never felt so much love in my life.” And then, in a prescient moment, he said, “It will never be like this again.” How did he know?

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My son Quinn, 24, believes in God. I did not know this until yesterday when I talked with him for this essay.

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Some years ago, I went to a health spa in California. I was exhausted and depressed from caring for a chronically ill and severely learning disabled child. One of the activities offered was a walk on the labyrinth.

I had never heard of a labyrinth, the kind you walk on. I thought it was a maze or a puzzle. The walk was described to me as a form of meditation. At first I refused, thinking it sounded too hokey for words. But finally out of curiosity I decided to try it.

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Several years ago a friend asked me and a number of her other friends to write essays on what it means to be a woman. She was going to make a book out of it and give it to her daughter for her 21st birthday. I sat at the computer for hours and nothing came to me. Then, suddenly, I knew what to say. I bought a postcard with an alluring picture of a woman on it and I wrote simply, “Women have all the power.”

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“There has always been tension in Hinduism between sexuality and celibacy,” said Sudhir Kakar, a noted Indian psychoanalyst who also has translated--with “On Faith” panelist Wendy Doniger--the Kamasutra.

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Someone asked me about 10 years ago what I would like written on my epitaph. I responded immediately without even hesitating. “Good mother, good wife, good daughter, good friend.”

He was surprised at my answer. Not as surprised as I was, though. Most people, he said, talked about their careers. Funny, I hadn’t even thought about that. When did it all change? I’ve been pondering the question ever since, asking myself what really matters to me? What are my priorities? What are my goals? What gives my life meaning?

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Today is Veterans Day. I grew up an Army brat. After Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, and the Fourth of July, the two days we remembered in our family were Veterans Day and Memorial Day. My father, Lt. General William W. "Buffalo Bill" Quinn, a West Point graduate, would recount stories of how important it was to support and remember those who had fought for our country.

My father was a great patriot. An Episcopalian, he was also a religious man. “God and Country” were not just words to him. This was his credo.

During World War II he served as the G2 or Intelligence Officer for the Seventh Army in Germany. He was there the day the Army liberated Dachau, one of the most infamous of the Nazi Concentration camps. He had his staff photographer take pictures of what they saw when they arrived and he had scrapbooks made up of those unimaginably horrific images.

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