In the midst of an established monastic life, Richard Carter answered a new call, leaving his life of 15 years in the Melanesian Brotherhood to answer a need in a busy church in the heart of London, Saint Martin-in-the-Fields. There Carter founded the Nazareth Community. Its diverse members--in Samuel Wells' words from the foreword, a community of faith and forsaken, wondrous and woolly--gather from everyday life to seek God in contemplation, to acknowledge their dependence on God's grace, and to learn to live openly and generously with all. With wit, wisdom, and generosity, Richard Carter tells the story of the Nazareth Community, and offers spiritual insight for daily Gospel life rooted in these seven spiritual pillars: Silence, Service, Scripture, Sacrament, Sharing, Sabbath Time and Staying.

A major new history of medieval monasticism, from the fourth to the sixteenth century

From the late Roman Empire onwards, monasteries and convents were a common sight throughout Europe. But who were monasteries for? What kind of people founded and maintained them? And how did monasticism change over the thousand years or so of the Middle Ages?

Andrew Jotischky traces the history of monastic life from its origins in the fourth century to the sixteenth. He shows how religious houses sheltered the poor and elderly, cared for the sick, and educated the young. They were centres of intellectual life that owned property and exercised power but also gave rise to new developments in theology, music, and art.

This book brings together the Orthodox and western stories, as well as the experiences of women, to show the full picture of medieval monasticism for the first time. It is a fascinating, wide-ranging account that broadens our understanding of life in holy orders as never before.

The Ladder of Divine Ascent is an ascetical treatise on avoiding vice and practicing virtue so that at the end, salvation can be obtained. Written by Saint John Climacus initially for monastics, it has become one of the most highly influential and important works used by the Church as far as guiding the faithful to a God-centered life, second only to Holy Scripture.

Sisters from around the world reflect on a synodal vision for the church and engage in a contemplative dialogue on the emerging future of religious life.

The story of religious life over the centuries displays two enduring qualities: constancy and change. God's love is constant, as is the changing state of the human condition lived on earth, our common home. Each generation of religious is faced with reading the signs of the times to faithfully navigate the intersection of constancy and change. But what are we to do in this time of renewal? In Reseeding Religious Life through Global Sisterhood, sisters from around the world reflect on a synodal vision and engage in a contemplative dialogue on the emerging future of religious life.

In this hopeful volume, sisters share perspectives on their rich heritage while continuing to till the soil of religious life with their encounters, transforming and deepening their charismatic identity with each conversation. Through this process, readers may come to understand how tending to the wounds of the poor and the planet becomes an awakening to embracing the intersection of the ecologies; social, economic, environmental, political, cultural, and spiritual. Reseeding Religious Life through the Global Sisterhood challenges all who dwell in faithfulness to God to a charismatic synodality: one that reveals the unfolding narrative of all our interconnections, calls us to nurture the conversations that will energize our distinct charisms, and inspires the flourishing of an emerging global sisterhood.

Contributors include:
Chioma Ahanihu, SLW
Monica Marie Cardona, VDMF
Ricca Dimalibot, CCVI
Susan Rose Francois, CSJP
Tracey Horan, SP​
Katty Huanuco, CCVI
Nkechi Iwuoha, PHJC
Sarah Kohles, OSF
Teresa Maya, CCVI
Juliet Mousseau, RSCJ

Revised edition of Tim Vivian's Becoming Fire continues to inspire readers with ancient wisdom for modern Christian contemplation.

The sayings of the desert monks of the fifth and sixth centuries continue to inspire readers with their wisdom, and those who read them as the ancients did, slowly and reflectively, still learn from the insights they offer. In this revised edition of Becoming Fire: Through the Year with the Desert Fathers and Mothers, Tim Vivian arranges these stories in short daily readings and invites readers to savor the monks' advice as guides to Christian living.
This volume provides:

• sayings and stories for each day of the year to use for lectio divina.
• saints and revered persons from the Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Episcopalian traditions.
• sayings from the Philokalia and the fourth-fifth century monastic writers Neilos of Ancyra and Hyperechios, among others.

In addition, there is a glossary of important monastic terms with cross-references to the fuller glossary in volume two of The Sayings and Stories of the Desert Fathers and Mothers (Cistercian Publications, 2023). Perfect for students and enthusiasts of the desert tradition and desert monasticism.

Carthusian spirituality and wisdom have a great attraction for our age. The goal of Carthusian life is union with God in Love. A union as profound and continual as is possible in this life. It has its source in God who is the first to call us to intimacy with Him. The Carthusian's life, the Carthusian's love, is a response to that Love - cultivating solitude, silence, poverty, chastity, obedience, fraternal charity, spiritual reading, study, work and, above all, prayer. Prayer of adoration, praise and intercession. This book is written as a guide to help the beginner during his first months in the Charterhouse. It is a practical introduction for the aspirant to the Carthusian life, providing guidelines of orientation to help during the first steps in solitude as well as essential themes of spiritual formation. Following the young monk, listening in complete openness to God who speaks in the depth of his heart, the reader outside the monastery can gain an insight into this powerful spirituality and the silence of a heart in love. Other books of classic Carthusian spirituality published by Gracewing include The Call of Silent Love, Early Carthusian Writings, Interior Prayer, The Prayer of Love and Silence, They Speak by Silences, The Way of Silent Love and The Wound of Love.

The Rule of St. Benedictforms the foundation for one of the oldest ongoing institutions in all of Western civilization. The Rule not only defines life for men and women in monasteries but has also become central to the spirituality of lay Christians across the globe.

This gender-neutral translation is true to the original text but provides an alternative for individuals and groups who prefer such a version over the masculine language of the original as it was written for St. Benedict's monks. It also offers some background into the context in which it was written, as well as reflections on its meaning for contemporary life, making it a resource for those encountering the Rule for the first time or those who have cherished it for years.

See also version with the Rule in inclusive translation only (no commentary) by Judith Sutera, OSB

Brother Lawrence describes how practicing the presence of God is a method to be closer to God. Since 1692 people have found his book helpful to live their own life in the here and now.

The book is very personable as it was written in letters, conversations, with Nicholas Herman, of Lorraine, France. Brother Lawrence was at the bottom of the monastery power structure, working as a shoemaker and kitchen help his whole life. Even there, he was admired for bringing God, and God's comfort, into his life and the lives of others.

His letters are an inspiration for all who toil.

No student of thought should be without this historic book. This edition is provided in a slim volume with full text at an affordable price.

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AND NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR

Vivid, compelling... An embrace of moral and spiritual contemplation. -The New York Times

A remarkable piece of writing. If read with humility and attention, Kathleen Norris's book becomes lectio divina, or holy reading. -The Boston Globe

From the iconic author of Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith, a spiritual journey that brings joy to the meanings of love, grace and faith.

Why would a married woman with a thoroughly Protestant background and often more doubt than faith be drawn to the ancient practice of monasticism, to a community of celibate men whose days are centered on a rigid schedule of prayer, work, and scripture? This is the question that poet Kathleen Norris asks us as, somewhat to her own surprise, she found herself on two extended residencies at St. John's Abbey in Minnesota.

Part record of her time among the Benedictines, part meditation on various aspects of monastic life, The Cloister Walk demonstrates, from the rare perspective of someone who is both an insider and outsider, how immersion in the cloistered world-- its liturgy, its ritual, its sense of community-- can impart meaning to everyday events and deepen our secular lives. In this stirring and lyrical work, the monastery, often considered archaic or otherworldly, becomes immediate, accessible, and relevant to us, no matter what our faith may be.

St. Maximus the Confessor (1955) is a collection of theological works by the 1st-century monk St. Maximus, as well as interpretation by Polycarp Sherwood, an American Benedictine scholar from the 20th century. Including both The Ascetic Life and The Four Centuries on Charity by St. Maximus, as well as detailed research into the life and beliefs of the monk by Sherwood, this work includes both source material and commentary.

The work begins with Life by Sherwood, a deep exploration into the life and theistic beliefs of St. Maximus. Born in 580 CE, Maximus enjoyed an education that prepared him for imperial service. He fulfilled this goal early in his career, serving as first secretary to the Byzantine emperor Heraclius.

But he soon withdrew to monastic asceticism at Chrysopolis, seeking a routine of solitude and thought. Throughout his life, he traveled across the Byzantine Empire, including present-day Turkey, Crete, and parts of Africa, clarifying his position on important theological issues and writing his many works.

Eventually, he was drawn into one of the great Christian controversies of the day-the nature of Christ's will. Maximus supported the Chalcedonian interpretation, which stated that Christ had both a human and a divine will. This was in contrast to the Monothelite position, accepted as canon at the time, which held that Christ had both a divine and human nature, but only a divine will.

For this belief, Maximus was persecuted. Eventually, his tongue was cut out and his right hand cut off, so he could no longer speak or write his heresy. He was then exiled to modern-day Georgia, where he died after just a few weeks. He was soon after vindicated and his position was upheld by the Third Council of Constantinople just 18 years after his death. It wasn't long before he was venerated as a saint.

The next section, Doctrine, is also by Sherwood, and it explores St. Maximus' views on the nature of God as goodness itself, the nature of man as a composite of body and soul, and on the salvation and deification of man through the works of Christ and asceticism.

Next, we reach the works of St. Maximus himself. The first, The Ascetic Life, is a question-and-answer book in which a young brother asks an old wise man about the Christian life and the nature of Christ. In the old man's simple words, ...the purpose of the Lord's becoming man was our salvation.

The old man answers the young brother's questions about the nature of Christian love, forsaking attachment to the worldly, and how to devote oneself entirely to God.

Finally, the book concludes with The Four Centuries on Charity, also by St. Maximus. This collection of aphorisms is organized into four separate centuries, or collections of one hundred. Kept short to aid in memorization and providing subjects for prayer, these sayings were presented to a Father Elpidius for his reading and benefit.

The sayings range from the simple (Happy is the man who is able to love all men equally) to the more complex (Of the passions, it happens that some belong to the irascible, some to the concupiscible part of the soul. But both are moved by means of the senses.) Through study and prayer, St. Maximus hoped that these aphorisms would help the reader to live a Christ-like charity and grow closer to God.

A work for study and reflection, this collection of St. Maximus' writings and Polycarp Sherwood's research and interpretation illuminates the beauty of God's love and the peace of a life of charity and forgiveness.

What might the lives of contemporary monastics teach us about putting down roots? Whereas many of us are constantly on the go, stressed out, and focused on productivity, the life of a monk prioritizes staying put and paying attention. Many monks take a vow of stability that commits them to their home monastery, leading them to develop a deep connection with and knowledge of the land they inhabit. The monastic life teaches those who practice it to move more slowly through the world, and the monastic sense of place may even hold a key to responding to the growing ecological crisis threatening our environment.

Dwelling in the Wilderness examines how contemporary Benedictine Roman Catholic monks in the American West fall in love with their landscapes and how, in troubled times, we might do the same. Jason Brown travels to four monasteries--the New Camaldoli Hermitage in Big Sur, California; the Abbey of Our Lady of New Clairvaux in Vina, California; Our Lady of Guadalupe Trappist Abbey in Carlton, Oregon; and the Monastery of Christ in the Desert in Abiquiu, New Mexico--and spends time with the monks there, following their daily routine of prayer and tending to the land. He learns how the places they inhabit are essential to their daily spiritual practice and how they construct deeper theological meaning from the natural world.

Illustrated with Brown's photography of monastic landscapes, his journey as a pilgrim anthropologist is astute, insightful, and intimate. He explores theories of environmental perception, philosophy, and symbolic landscapes in accessible language. Bringing theological reflection to the power of contemplative ecology in an era many are calling the Anthropocene, or the age of human domination, he leads us to reconsider our relationship with our natural homes.

An inspiring narrative history of the oldest congregation of Benedictine monasteries in the United States.

Commissioned by the American-Cassinese Benedictine Congregation, Schools for the Lord's Service is a comprehensive narrative history of the oldest congregation of Benedictine monasteries in the United States. In vivid detail, it describes how monasteries of the American-Cassinese Congregation initiated monastic life in North America according to the Rule of St. Benedict and how, in doing so, they have engaged for nearly 170 years with the American Catholic Church, the global Benedictine Order, the Holy See, and American society.

Following a Benedictine tradition that stretches back to the early Middle Ages, American-Cassinese monks spread out from Pennsylvania to establish monasteries throughout the United States. Led by Boniface Wimmer, a visionary monk from the Bavarian abbey of Metten, the Benedictines introduced monastic observance according to the Rule of St. Benedict in these monasteries, and from them they founded missions, parishes, and schools where they continue to carry on pastoral, educational, and missionary apostolates in the service of the people of God. Comprised of twenty-five monasteries located in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, and Taiwan, the legacy and spirit of the American-Cassinese Benedictines continues to reinforce and complement the words of Abbot Boniface Wimmer who constantly exhorted his Benedictine brothers and sisters, Forward, always forward.

Previously unpublished material from world-renowned Trappist monk and author, Thomas Merton, featuring the final conference talks given in the United States before his untimely death.

In May and October of 1968, Thomas Merton offered two extended conferences at Our Lady of the Redwoods Abbey, a Cistercian women's community in Northern California. Comprising over twenty-six hours of previously unpublished material, Thomas Merton in California covers a variety of topics including ecology and consciousness, yoga and Hinduism, Native American ritual and rites of passage, Sufi spirituality, and inter-religious dialogue, along with extended discussions on prayer and the contemplative life.

The material presented in these talks reveals Merton's wide-ranging intellectual and spiritual pursuits in the final year of his life, and fills a long-standing lacuna around Merton's visits to Redwoods Monastery, forming a necessary bridge to the Asian journey that was to come. Practical and applicable, as well as searching and inspired, Thomas Merton in California is essential for Merton readers and scholars, and all those interested in deepening their spiritual lives.

The Rule of St. Benedict forms the foundation for one of the oldest ongoing institutions in all of Western civilization. The Rule not only defines life for men and women in monasteries but has also become central to the spirituality of lay Christians across the globe.

This gender-neutral translation is true to the original text but provides an alternative for individuals and groups who prefer such a version over the masculine language of the original as it was written for St. Benedict's monks.

See also version with daily commentary by Judith Sutera, OSB

Award-winning French author shares the biography and spiritual journey of Cistercian abbot Dom André Louf.

Based on a wide variety of interviews, printed sources, and Dom André Louf's spiritual journal, The Way of the Heart narrates Louf's spiritual journey from his childhood in Flanders through his becoming a monk in a Cistercian monastery, his ten years of retirement as a hermit in a Benedictine monastery in the south of France, and his death. Throughout his life he periodically struggled with conflicting vocational desires--sometimes wishing to serve as a pastor, academic, abbot, or to immerse himself in eremitic contemplation. That struggle is the leading thread through this biography, which portrays a man whose immense gifts pulled him in many directions, while always endeavoring to submit himself to God's will.

A lively and challenging exploration of things the contemporary Church needs to learn from monastic communities, things it has lost and needs to rediscover.

The Sayings of the desert fathers is the collective wisdom of the monks who lived in the Egyptian desert. This collection of sayings is a summery of their, victories, struggles, downfalls, and teachings on the spiritual life. For centuries these sayings have taught and inspired men and women to live the monastic life and guided them throughout their monastic vocation.

In 1960 Marius Chaîne sadly died before he was able to see the publication of the Sahidic version of the Sayings of the Fathers, which he had gathered together from fragments of a single dismembered codex that had found their way, at various times and in various ways, into European libraries.

This book is not intended to be a study of the collection, but simply a translation for the first time into the English language. There are at least two different ways of organizing the sayings; alphabetical, as in the Greek text in the Patrologia Graeca 65, 71-440 and thematic, as in the Patrologia Latina 73: 855- 1022 texts. The arrangement of this Coptic version, probably translated from Greek, is closer to that of the PL text.

Brother Lawrence describes how practicing the presence of God is a method to be closer to God. Since 1692 people have found his book helpful to live their own life in the here and now.

The book is very personable as it was written in letters, conversations, with Nicholas Herman, of Lorraine, France. Brother Lawrence was at the bottom of the monastery power structure, working as a shoemaker and kitchen help his whole life. Even there, he was admired for bringing God, and God's comfort, into his life and the lives of others.

His letters are an inspiration for all who toil.

No student of thought should be without this historic book. This edition is provided in a slim volume with full text at an affordable price.