This book centers on a Greek text that was likely compiled in Constantinople, in 1105, for use in one of the monasteries located there. The book consists of a liturgical psalter, containing the fixed structure (the ordinary) in both the Greek original and in English translation, as well as a description of the hours themselves. The extensive commentary explains the development of the divine office, and the particular history of the translated manuscript, while brief notes clarify and explain, in a way suitable for non-liturgists, the more-technical aspects of the divine office. Based on a single dated manuscript, the book presents the first, full example of the daily structure of monastic hours as they were celebrated at a time when services had reached a degree of maturity. The book, by presenting the ordinary of the office, compliments recent work on the propers of the office, and thus helps to complete our picture of the medieval monastic office in Byzantium.

Discussion of site and buildings, books and manuscripts, cultural life and traditions, from the earliest Anglo-Saxon period to the later middle ages. Glastonbury Abbey was one of the great cultural centres of Anglo-Saxon and medieval England, yet this is the first volume of scholarly essays to be devoted to the subject. Written in honour of C. A. Ralegh Radford, the first itemsare concerned with the physical remains of the abbey, ranging from the place of Glastonbury in the development of Christianity in Somerset to specific examinations of surviving monastic buildings. The main body of the essays explores documents relating to the abbey for evidence of its history and traditions, including the earliest Anglo-Saxon period, pre-conquest abbots, and links with the Celtic world. The final section deals with the cultural life of the abbey: Glastonbury's role in education is discussed and the concluding essay deals with the most magical of all Glastonbury legends - its link with Joseph of Arimathea and the Grail. Contributors: PHILIP RAHTZ, MICHAEL D. COSTEN, C.J. BOND, J.B. WELLER, ROBERT W. DUNNING, LESLEY ABRAMS, JAMES P. CARLEY, ANN DOOLEY, SARAH FOOT, DAVID THORNTON, RICHARD SHARPE, JULIA CRICK, OLIVER J.PADEL, MATTHEW BLOWS, CHARLES T. WOOD, NICHOLAS ORME, CERIDWENLLOYD-MORGAN, FELICITY RIDDY.

The sixteenth century was a period of crisis in the Catholic Church. Monastic reorganization was a major issue, and women were at the forefront of charting new directions in convent policy. The story of the Carmelite Reform has been told before, but never from the perspective of the women on the front lines. Nearly all accounts of the movement focus on Teresa de Avila, (1515-1582), and end with her death in 1582. Women Religious and Epistolary Exchange in the Carmelite Reform: The Disciples of Teresa de Avila carries the story beyond Teresa's death, showing how the next generation of Carmelite nuns struggled into the seventeenth century to continue her mission. It is unique in that it draws primarily from female-authored sources, in particular, the letters of three of Teresa's most dynamic disciples: Maria de San Jose, Ana de Jesus and Ana de San Bartolome.

Since its publication in 1989, "The Riddle of Amish Culture" has become recognized as a classic work on one of America's most distinctive religious communities. But many changes have occurred within Amish society over the past decade, from westward migrations and a greater familiarity with technology to the dramatic shift away from farming into small business which is transforming Amish culture. For this revised edition, Donald B. Kraybill has taken these recent changes into account, incorporating new demographic research and new interviews he has conducted among the Amish. In addition, he includes a new chapter describing Amish recreation and social gatherings, and he applies the concept of "social capital" to his sensitive and penetrating interpretation of how the Amish have preserved their social networks and the solidarity of their community.

This book continues Brother Tom-Nicholas' series on the lives of the saints. As in his first book, Calling All Saints, Brother Tom reveals how saints weren't stained-glass superhumans on pedestals, but hard-working men and women who did small things in a great way for the love of God. "I also wanted to write a book for all those who think organised religion is an absolute con... but just might be willing to read funny stories that sneak in a moral about following Christ. May these little stories give you the hope, the courage and the inspiration to try and become the hero or heroine that God knows you can be."

"Negotiating the Landscape" explores the question of how medieval religious identities were shaped and modified by interaction with the natural environment. Focusing on the Benedictine monastic community of Stavelot-Malmedy in the Ardennes, Ellen F. Arnold draws upon a rich archive of charters, property and tax records, correspondence, miracle collections, and saints' lives from the seventh to the mid-twelfth century to explore the contexts in which the monks' intense engagement with the natural world was generated and refined.Arnold argues for a broad cultural approach to medieval environmental history and a consideration of a medieval environmental imagination through which people perceived the nonhuman world and their own relation to it. Concerned to reassert medieval Christianity's vitality and variety, Arnold also seeks to oppose the historically influential view that the natural world was regarded in the premodern period as provided by God solely for human use and exploitation. The book argues that, rather than possessing a single unifying vision of nature, the monks drew on their ideas and experience to create and then manipulate a complex understanding of their environment. Viewing nature as both wild and domestic, they simultaneously acted out several roles, as stewards of the land and as economic agents exploiting natural resources. They saw the natural world of the Ardennes as a type of wilderness, a pastoral haven, and a source of human salvation, and actively incorporated these differing views of nature into their own attempts to build their community, understand and establish their religious identity, and relate to others who shared their landscape.

These diary entries written by Dorothy Day in 1948 provide an intimate look into Day's personal life as well as essential background for understanding the Catholic Worker movement, which she founded. In this book, Day writes about all facets of her life. Yet whether describing her visits to her daughter's farm or the writings of the saints, a common theme emerges, namely, the gifts of God's love and our need to respond to them with personal and social transformation. The concerns of the Catholic Worker movement are no less vital in our day: the disenfranchised poor, the benefits of the meaningful work, the significance of family, the dangers of increasing commercialism and secularism, the decline of moral standards, and the importance of faith. Available for the first time since it was originally published, this edition includes a foreword by Michael O. Garvey and an introduction by Mark and Louise Zwick that gives an overview of Day's early life and her commitment to the Catholic worker movement.

`A wise, learned, gracefully written account of the Anglo-Norman world and its most remarkable chronicler.' SPECULUM Orderic Vitalis, born near Shrewsbury in 1075 and sent as a child oblate to the Norman abbey of Saint-Evroult, wrote one of the most vivid and important medieval chronicles. His world encompassed Shropshire in the aftermath of theConquest, Normandy in civil war and at peace, and, briefly, the wider French perspective of the priory of Maule. Saint-Evroult was open to all the cross-currents of a changing society, and Orderic witnessed fundamental changes inchurch organisation, patterns of aristocratic inheritance, attitudes towards knighthood, and Christian militancy towards non-Christians. This book is concerned with monastic life and culture and its interaction with the life of courts and Norman families. It also describes the life of Orderic himself, and an appendix gives a translation of his own moving account of his life, an epilogue to the Historia.MARJORIE CHIBNALL is a Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge. She has written many booksand articles about the Anglo-Norman world, including an edition of Orderic's Ecclesiastical History.

This book shows how the kingdom of God has advanced through the progression of distinct covenants, collectively serving as the foundation for God's promise to bring redemption to his people.

Another classic from the foremost Trappist scholar writing today. Fr. Michael Casey, in his usual compelling style, covers many aspects of spirituality, including discernment, spiritual direction, pastoral care, and living in community-- applicable to religious and lay people alike. His reflections on Benedictine spirituality are vividly presented and filled with remarkable insights and advice.

One happy day, in the midst of writing to her fiancee, her hand stopped writing unbidden; then it continued by itself, etching the words which would change her life forever: '...but there's no point now, as I am going to be a nun.'That bolt from the blue set events in motion that caused Shirley to lose her mother and sisters, her husband to be, her horses, her parties and life of ease. Within months, Shirley had become Sister Agatha. But her faith in her choice never faltered, despite years of great difficulty when her Convent was close to bankruptcy. Her belief took her to London to knock on Sir Paul Getty's door to secure the money to ensure her community would not lose their home...and getting it. Now eighty-five, she looks back on an incredible life of love, loss and belief. This is at once a deeply poignant tale of doomed romance, and a heart-warming story of taking a leap of faith and finding a meaning in life beyond the wealth and comfort she was born into.Whether a believer or not, Sister Agatha's momentous life will touch and inspire, whilst reminding us that it is perhaps better to accept that not everything in the world is yet explained.

The Nun in the Synagogue documents the religious and cultural phenomenon of Judeocentric Catholicism that arose in the wake of the Holocaust, fueled by survivors who converted to Catholicism and immigrated to Israel as well as by Catholics determined to address the anti-Judaism inherent in the Church. Through an ethnographic study of selected nuns and monks, Emma O'Donnell Polyakov explores how this Judeocentric Catholic phenomenon began and continues to take shape in Israel. This book is a case study in Catholic perceptions of Jews, Judaism, and the state of Israel during a time of rapidly changing theological and cultural contexts. In it, Polyakov listens to and analyzes the stories of individuals living on the border between Christian and Jewish identity-including Jewish converts to Catholicism who continue to harbor a strong sense of Jewish identity and philosemitic Catholics who attend synagogue services every Shabbat. Polyakov traces the societal, theological, and personal influences that have given rise to this phenomenon and presents a balanced analysis that addresses the hermeneutical problems of interpreting Jews through Christian frameworks. Ultimately, she argues that, despite its problems, this movement signals a pluralistic evolution of Catholic understandings of Judaism and may prove to be a harbinger of future directions in Jewish-Christian relations. Highly original and methodologically sophisticated, The Nun in the Synagogue is a captivating exploration of biographical narratives and reflections on faith, conversion, Holocaust trauma, Zionism, and religious identity that lays the groundwork for future research in the field.

A study of the manuscripts, relics and historical traditions of Anglo-Saxon Exeter before Leofric moved the see of Devon and Cornwall there in 1050. In his search for an historical context for the famous Exeter Book of Old English poetry, Dr Conner's examination of the archaeological and textual records of Exeter have led him to significant new conclusions about the city's tenth century monastic culture. He posits the existence of a large library dating from the time of King AEthelstan, an active scriptorium from at least the mid-century period, and suggests that five other important manuscripts may have originated at Exeter c.950-c.990.A codicological examination of the Exeter Book draws fresh conclusions about its composition and its literary context. Anglo-Saxon Exeterconcludes with six appendices in which many documents important to the early history of the city are edited, including its relic-lists, the records for moving the see from Crediton to Exeter, Leofric's Inventory, a series of legal records which survive on a single leaf of an8th-century lectionary, and a study of the history of the Exeter Book from 1050 to the present. PATRICK CONNER is Professor in the department of English at West Virginia University.

Monastic Wales - new approaches is an interdisciplinary collection of essays written by some of the leading scholars working on aspects of medieval Welsh history. The chapters in this volume consider the history, archaeology, architecture and wider cultural, social, political and economic context of the religious houses of Wales between the Norman conquest in the eleventh century, and the dissolution of the monasteries in the sixteenth.

An analysis and study of Caroline script from 200 years of ecclesiastical and secular records reveals important historical detail relating to late Anglo-Saxon England. Caroline minuscule script was adopted in England in the mid-tenth century in imitation of Continental usage. A badge of ecclesiastical reform, it was practised in Benedictine scriptoria but was also taken up by members of the royal writing office; the chancery occupied an important place in the pioneering of calligraphic fashions. During its approximately two-century history in England, Caroline script developed a number of forms, in part reflecting different tendencies within the Reform-cause. The Rule of St Benedict was focal for this movement. In the aftermath of the final Scandinavian conquest of England [AD1016] a Canterbury master-scribe created the form ofCaroline writing which was to become a mark of Englishness and outlive the Norman Conquest. In the closing chapter its inventor's career is discussed and his achievement assessed. This volume offers analysis of manuscript evidenceas a basis for the cultural and ecclesiastical history of late Anglo-Saxon England. David N. Dumville is professor of History and Palaeography at the University of Aberdeen

Investigation of lives of the saint, Lindisfarneand its scriptorium and Gospels, and the treasures of Cuthbert's coffin.Very fine collection of essays...a rich feast of scholarship with many discoveries and new interpretations of greatest value for Anglo-Saxon history. SPECULUM `Very fine collection of essays - a rich feast of scholarship with many discoveries and new interpretations of greatest value for Anglo-Saxon history.' SPECULUM St Cuthbert is known to many as the the saintly bishop of Holy Island inthe 7th century, but he was also a figure of great political and territorial power. The book is divided into four sections, each dealing with different aspects of Cuthbert and his milieu. Among the topics investigatedare the early Livesof the Saint, two by Bede himself, and his cult; Lindisfarne, its scriptorium and of course the famous Gospels; the sumptuous treasures gathered round the coffin, such as a portable altar and elaborately-worked silks, many of which are still preserved at Durham; and St Cuthbert's community at Chester-le-Street and Durham. Contributors: J. CAMPBELL, CLARE STANCLIFFE, MICHAEL HERITY, BENEDICTA WARD SLG, MICHAEL LAPIDGE, WALTER BERSCHIN, ALAN THACKER, DEIRDRE O'SULLIVAN, CHRISTOPHER D. VEREY, MICHELLE P. BROWN, JANET BACKHOUSE, R. BRUCE-MITFORD, DAIBHI D CRDINN, NANCY NETZER, ROSEMARY CRAMP, RICHARD N. BAILEY, J.M. CRONYN, C.V. HORIE, R.I. PAGE, JOHN HIGGITT, ELIZABETH COASTWORTH, HERO GRANGER-TAYLOR, CLARE HIGGINS, ANNA MUTHESIUS, ERIC CAMBRIDGE, GERALD BONNER, LUISELLA SIMPSON, DAVID ROLLASON, DAVID HALL, A.J. PIPER, VICTORIA TUDOR

John W. O'Malley gives us the most comprehensive account ever written of the Society of Jesus in its founding years, one that heightens and transforms our understanding of the Jesuits in history and today. Following the Society from 1540 through 1565, O'Malley shows how this sense of mission evolved. He looks at everything-the Jesuits' teaching, their preaching, their casuistry, their work with orphans and prostitutes, their attitudes toward Jews and "New Christians," and their relationship to the Reformation. All are taken in by the sweep of O'Malley's story as he details the Society's manifold activities in Europe, Brazil, and India.

Wadi al-Natrun, a depression in the Western Desert of Egypt, west of the Nile Delta and 23 meters below sea level, is one of the most important centers for the development and continued thriving of the Coptic monastic tradition. Christianity and monasticism have flourished there from as early as the fourth century until the present day, when four major monasteries still flourish. The contributors to this volume, international specialists in Coptology from around the world, examine various aspects of Coptic civilization in Wadi al-Natrun over the past seventeen hundred years. The studies center on aspects of the history and development of monasticism in Wadi al-Natrun, as well as the art, architecture, and archaeology of the four existing and numerous former monasteries of the region.Contributors: Elizabeth S. Bolman, Karl-Heinz Brune, Peter Grossmann, Johannes den Heijer, Suzana Hodak, Lucy-Anne Hunt, Mat Immerzeel, Martin Krause, Ewa Parandowska, S.G. Richter, Rushdi Said, Zuzana Skalova, Hany H. Takla, Tim Vivian, Jacques van der Vliet, Youhanna Nessim Youssef, Ugo Zanetti.

Examination of the role of the convent superior in the middle ages, underlining the amount of power and responsibility at her command. The position of an abbess or prioress in the middle ages was one of great responsibility, with care for both the spiritual and economic welfare of her convent. This book considers the power wielded by and available to such women.It addresses leadership models, questions of social identity and the varying perceptions of the role and performance of the abbess or prioress via a close examination of the records of sixteen female houses in the period from 1280to 1540; the large range of documentary evidence used includes selections from episcopal registers, account rolls, plea rolls, Chancery documents, letters, petitions, medieval literature and comparative material from additional nunneries. The theme of conflict recurs throughout, as religious women are revealed steering their communities between the directives of the church and the demands of their budgets or their secular neighbours. The Dissolution and its effects on the morale and behaviour of the last superiors conclude the study.

The Knights Templar, part monastic order, part military force, lived by a firm code, or rule, which exists in differing versions. This Spanish version is a follow-up to J.M. Upton-Ward's highly successful edition of the French Rule. The introduction to this Catalan Rule, Barcelona Archivo de la Corona de Aragon, Cartes Reales, MS 3344, discusses the content, language and dating of the manuscript. It also provides background information derived from the French Rule (which the reader may require for a fuller appreciation of the text - see author note below) on the circumstances of the Knights Templar. There is a brief description of the provincial organisation of the Order with particular reference to the houses in Aragon, where it is most likely that the manuscript was used; a summary of clauses; and a concordance with de Curzon's 1886 edition of the French Rule. Compared to de Curzon's edition, the Barcelona text is incomplete, but it contains important clauses not found in other manuscripts. A partial transcription claiming to represent all the clauses without equivalents in de Curzon's edition was published in 1889, but it omitted several clauses now published here for the first time. Footnotes to the English translation elucidate the text; give biographical information on the named officers of the Order where possible; and indicate significant differences compared with the French Rule. J. M. UPTON-WARD edited and translated The Rule of the Templars (Boydell & Brewer 1998), now available in paperback.

An examination of the extraordinary texts produced by the community of St Cuthbert, showing how they were used to construct and define an identity. Historical texts of all kinds were written in the community of St Cuthbert c.700-1130, from short annals to extended narrative history, political tracts and works on the lives and miracles of saints.At the same time, scribes in the community worked to copy and procure notable classics of historiography, from Classical Antiquity down to the Norman Conquest of England. But what did these various forms of writing about past events mean to their original authors and readers? What were these texts for? This book offers a narrative of historiographical production within St Cuthbert's community from the time of its foundation on the island of Lindisfarne, through subsequent translations to Chester-le-Street and Durham, down to the vibrant intellectual revival of the Anglo-Norman period. Focusing on several watershed moments in the story of this community, it identifies political, religious, intellectual andcultural triggers for historical writing, and argues that knowledge of past events gave successive guardians of Cuthbert's cult their single most valuable tool in the continuous effort to define who they were, where they had comefrom, and what they hoped to continue to be.

"There is no shortage of good days," writes Annie Dillard. "It is good lives that are hard to come by." Reflecting on what makes a "good life," Robert Benson offers a warmhearted, humorous guide to enriching our lives with the wisdom of Benedict, a 6th century monk. Each chapter is shaped around a Benedictine principle: prayer, rest, community, and work, and reveals the brilliant and infinitely practical ways that Benedictine spirituality can shape our lives today. Benson is honest and wise, sharing his own failings and the constant tension that he feels between the demands of the temporal and the spiritual. For anyone who feels caught in a web of conflicting priorities, or who finds the pace of modern life more draining than fulfilling, A Good Life will come as a welcome treat for the soul.

Revered by millions, the Papacy is an international power that many nations have viewed with suspicion, some have tried to control, and not a few have spied upon. Ranging across two centuries of world history, David Alvarez's fascinating study throws open the Vatican's doors to reveal the startling but little-known world of espionage in one of the most sacred places on earth.

Reviewing the pontificates of ten popes--from Pius VII, Napoleon's nemesis, to Pius XII, maligned by some as "Hitler's pope"--Alvarez provides the first history of the intelligence operations and covert activities that reached the highest levels of the Vatican. Populated with world leaders, both famous and infamous, and a rogue's gallery of professional spies, fallen priests, and mercenary informants, his work casts a bright light into the darker corners of papal history and international diplomacy, a light that often sparkles with a witty appreciation of the foibles of the espionage trade.

Alvarez reveals that the Vatican itself occasionally entered this clandestine world through such operations as a network of informants to spy on liberal Catholics or a covert mission to establish an underground church in the Soviet Union. More frequently, however, the Vatican was the target for hostile intelligence services seeking to expose the secrets of the Papacy. During World War I, for example,
Pope Benedict XV's personal assistant was a secret German agent. During World War II, Germany, Italy, Russia, and the United States sent spies into the Vatican to discover the pope's intentions. The Nazis were especially resourceful, securing the services of apostate priests, such as Herbert Keller, an unscrupulous monk who exposed Pope Pius XII's involvement in a plot against Hitler, and devising a plan to establish a "seminary" in Rome with agents posing as student priests. Alvarez recounts these operations and many more, including the methods by which the Vatican learned about the Holocaust.

Based on diplomatic and intelligence records in Britain, France, Italy, Spain, the United States, and the Vatican--with the latter including documents sealed after the author had access to them--"Spies in the Vatican" reveals that the Papacy often was hindered by its inability to collect timely and relevant intelligence and that it made little effort to improve its intelligence capabilities after 1870. Challenging the long-held notion that the pope is the world's best-informed leader, Alvarez illuminates not only the inner workings of the Vatican but also the global events in which it was inextricably involved.