This is the first book to provide a comprehensive account of the emergence of monasticism from its roots in late antiquity and its transition to the early medieval West. Beginning with the search for individual perfection in the context of the religious and social climate of fourth-century Egypt, it traces the adoption and transformation of monastic ideas and practices first by the elites of the Western Roman Empire and later by the royalty and aristocracy of the so-called 'barbarian' kingdoms, including the Franks and Anglo-Saxons. It tracks the development of monastic rules and includes sections on female asceticism and monasticism, on Irish monasticism and its influence, and the developing theology of afterlife and intercession. This unique work is based on a detailed consideration of the texts, their use and adaptation, and is the first treatment of the subject to draw together social and religious approaches. The book offers a number of original perspectives on major issues and controversies.

Ancrene Wisse introduced through a variety of cultural and critical approaches which establish the originality and interest of the treatise. The thirteenth-century Ancrene Wisse is a guide for female recluses. Addressed to three young sisters of gentle birth, it teaches what truly good anchoresses should and should not do, offering in its examples a glimpse of the real life women had in England in the middle ages. It is also important for its evidence for the continuation of the Anglo-Saxon tradition of prose writing, being produced in the West Midlands where Old English writing conventions continued to develop even after the Norman conquest. The Companion addresses the cultural and historical background, the affiliations of the versions, genre, authorship and language; the various approaches also includea feminist reading of the text. Contributors ROGER DAHOOD, RICHARD DANCE, A.S.G. EDWARDS, CATHERINE INNES-PARKER, BELLA MILLETT, CHRISTINA VON NOLCKEN, ELIZABETH ROBERTSON, ANNE SAVAGE, D.A. TROTTER, YOKO WADA, NICHOLAS WATSON.

The first black Cathotic sisterhood in the United States; Founded in Baltimore in 1828 by a French Sulpician priest and a mulatto Caribbean immigrant, the Oblate Sisters of Providence formed the first permanent African American Roman Catholic sisterhood in the United States. It still exists today. Exploring the slavery-era history of this pioneering sisterhood, which took as its practical mission the education of black children, Diane Batts Morrow demonstrates the centrality of race in the Oblate experience. By their very existence, the Oblate Sisters challenged prevailing social, political, and cultural attitudes on many levels. White society viewed women of color as lacking in moral standing and sexual virtue; at the same time, the sisters' vows of celibacy flew in the face of conventional female roles as wives and mothers. But the Oblate Sisters' religious commitment proved both liberating and empowering, says Morrow. They inculcated into their communal identity positive senses of themselves as black women and as women religious, Strengthened by their spiritual fervor, the sisters defied the inferior social status white society ascribed to them and the ambivalence the Catholic Church demonstrated toward them. They successfully persevered in dedicating themselves to spiritual practice in the Roman Catholic tradition.

Among New Orleans most compelling stories is that of the Sisters of the Holy Family, which was founded in the 19th century and still thrives today. The community s difficult early years are portrayed in a remarkable account by one of the sisters, Mary Bernard Deggs. While Deggs did not officially join the community until 1873, as a student at the sisters early school she would have known Henriette Delille and the other founders. It was not until 1852 that the sisters were able to take their first official vows and exchange their blue percale gowns for black ones, and it was 1873 before they were permitted to wear a formal religious habit. This community of mixed race faced almost insurmountable obstacles, but the women remained unflagging in their dedication to the poor, to education, and to the care of the elderly and the orphaned to the needs of "their people."

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This book depicts the lives of female monks within a monastery located in upper Egypt in the period 385-464 CE. During this period the monastery was headed by a monk named Shenoute; twelve of his letters to the women under his care survive. Despite various technical textual difficulties, Krawiec is able to use the letters to reconstruct a series of quarrels and events in the life of the White Monastery and to discern some of the key patterns in the participants' relationships to one another within the world as they perceived it. She begins by describing the monks' daily routine and discovers that the monastery's culture was based on uniformity, in both material goods and emotional support, for all the monks, regardless of background. The female monks' relationship with Shenoute constructed and exerted his authority in these conditions, and investigates the degree to which the women accepted it.

The astonishing and exiting story of Julie Billiart, the French peasant woman who founded the Sisters of Notre Dame out of the aftermath of the French Revolution. Myra Poole has been a Notre Dame sister for more than forty years. For much of that time was a teacher of history and a headteacher, taking early retirement to study women's theology in the USA, Holland and London. She has been instrumental in founding numerous women's groups including Catholic Women's Network; Catholic Women's Ordination and the British and Irish School of Feminist Theology.

This book intriduces readers to the essential writings of Bernard of Clairvaux, a Cistercian mink who was famous in his own time as atheologian, statesman, and mystic.

J. Thomas Merton (1915-1968) was a twenty-year-old sophomore when he was introduced to fellow student Robert Lax (1915-2000) in the Columbia University cafeteria in 1935. They were brought together by an admiration for each other's writing in the college humor magazine. Upon graduation in 1938, Merton converted to Roman Catholicism; Lax began graduate study in English and took a job at the New Yorker. Three years later, Merton entered the Abbey of Gethsemani, and he and Lax saw each other only four more times. Yet their friendship was sustained for the next thirty-three years through an amazing correspondence.

Their letters show Merton as an irreverent and often hilarious critic of presidents and popes. He also turned to serious issues, such as the war in Vietnam and the dangers of nuclear holocaust. Merton and Lax's correspondence is filled with reminiscences of friends and faculty from their years at Columbia, including Mark van Doren, Lionel Trilling, Ad Reinhardt, Edward Rice, and Jacques Barzun. These letters of two poets and solitaries betray a giddy delight in wordplay, unconstrained by rules of grammar or conventions of spelling. Puns, portmanteaus, and inside jokes abound. The thirty-year exchange began when Merton dashed off a note on June 17, 1938, after spending a week with Lax's family.

The final epistle in this extraordinary correspondence was written by Lax on December 8, 1968. Merton died in Bangkok five days later and never received it. Arthur Biddle spent nearly ten years collecting every letter known to exist between Merton and Lax, a total of 346, two thirds of which have never been published. Biddle provides chronologies of their lives and places events and people in context within the letters. This volume also includes the text of a rare interview with Lax.

Arthur W. Biddle is professor emeritus of English at the University of Vermont.

Also available as an eBook

The world-renowned Monks of New Skete have distilled their collective spiritual wisdom into a book that explains how the elements of a monk's life — self-discipline, solitude, prayer, acts of love and forgiveness — are pathways that anyone can follow to achieve true happiness and spiritual fulfillment.

Based on a treasure trove of letters, this fascinating book tells the history of a seventeenth-century nun in a convent in Leuven and how her complaints-of sexual harassment, fears of demonic possession, alliances among the other sisters against her-led to her banishment from the convent on two occasions. Highly acclaimed when it was first published as a revealing look at female religious life in early modern Europe, the book is now available in an abridged paperbound version with a new preface by the author. Reviews of the clothbound edition: "A window to the past. . . . I loved, just loved, this book."-Carolyn See, Washington Post "The world Mr. Harline uncovers is a fascinating one. . . . The story of Sister Margaret gives an extra dimension of humanity to a turning point in the history of ideas."-Sonia Gernes, Wall Street Journal "Better-than-fiction social history. . . . This is a glimpse into diaries, letters, hearts, minds, hatreds, and hopes; it will enthrall."-Christian Century "Harline's graceful writing allows the women and men in this religious community to breathe, gossip, pray with tears. . . . The Burdens of Sister Margaret helps us see the familiar Reformation in a fresh way."-Kevin A. Miller, Christianity Today "Microhistory at its best."-Larissa Taylor, Renaissance Quarterly

After living the Rule and studying it for many years, the author introduces it to those who are encountering it for the first time. The relationship of Benedict's Rule to other early monastic legislation is treated thoroughly but the book is designed for those who are seeking a guide for christian living in this little rule for beginners'.

William Short summs up the Franciscan tradition as 'chaotic and intuitive, creative and affectionate, radical and obedient', and shows it to be as appealing a way of life today as in the past. He focuses on St Francis of Assisi and St Clare, the Franciscan founders, offers an historical introduction to the Order before illuminating their vision and reflects on key themes of the Incarnation, poverty as a way to God, suffering and healing, and of creation - humanity and nature in harmony. The book forms a bridge between contempoary concerns and the wisdom of the past.

Christians have been drawn to monastic life nearly as long as Christianity has existed. Dedicating themselves to prayer, meditation, and good works, men and women in many diverse times and places have been willing to abstain from marriage, sexual relations, and personal ownership to serve God singlemindedly. In this overview of the Latin tradition, Peter King, emeritus senior lecturer of medieval history at Saint Andrew's University, leads readers quickly but deftly along the rugged monastic road from late antique Egypt to the present day, passing through spectacular expansion in medieval Europe, dissolution during the Reformation, retrenchment at the Counter Reformation, condemnation during the Enlightenment, destruction at the hands of revolutionaries, refoundation and new vigor during the nineteenth and the ecumenical twentieth centuries.

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.

25 presentations on the spiritual life, with four major talks by H.H. the Dalai Lama.>

This important new book covers the time between Paul's conversion in Damascus and his arrival in Antioch, set against a detailed background of the early Christian world, the church in Damascus to which Paul was introduced on his conversion, the methods of the first Christian mission, the situation in Arabia during Paul's first mission, the mission territory in Tarsus and Cilicia to which he then moved, and the nature of the church in Antioch. Martin Hengel once more challenges the overly skeptical assessments of the New Testament record and provides powerful support for his position on Paul.

Made doubly marginal by their gender and by their religion, American nuns have rarely been granted serious scholarly attention. Instead, their lives and achievements have been obscured by myths or distorted by stereotypes. Placing nuns into the mainstream of American religious and women's history for the first time, Spirited Lives reveals their critical impact on the development of Catholic culture and, ultimately, the building of American society. Focusing on the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, one of the largest and most diverse American sisterhoods, Carol Coburn and Martha Smith explore how nuns directly influenced the lives of millions of Americans, both Catholic and non-Catholic, through their work in schools, hospitals, orphanages, and other social service institutions. Far from functioning as passive handmaidens for Catholic clergy and parishes, nuns created, financed, and administered these institutions, struggling with, and at times resisting, male secular and clerical authority. A rich and multifaceted narrative, Spirited Lives illuminates the intersection of gender, religion, and power in nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century America. |Reveals the critical impact of nuns on the development of Catholic culture and American society between 1836 and 1940. Focusing on the sisters of St. Joseph of Carondolet, this book shows how nuns directly influenced millions of Americans through their work in schools, hospitals, orphanages, and other social service institutions.

Considers many facets of the medieval church, dealing with institutions, buildings, personalities and literature. The text explores the origins of the diocese and the parish, the history of the See of Hereford and of York Minster. It discusses the arrival of the archdeacon, the Normans as cathedral builders and the kings of England and Scotland as monastic patrons. The studies of monastic life deal with the European question of monastic vocation and with St Bernard's part in the sensational expansion of the early 12th century. An epilogue takes us to the 14th century, contrasting Chaucer's parson with an actual Norfolk rector.

The monastery has often been likened to a powerhouse of prayer, providing light and energy for the countless numbers who make up the Body of Christ. This image has inadvertently furthered the view of monasticism as separate from the rest of the Church, apart from the concerns of the world." In Lovers of the Place, Abbot Kline provides a fresh Vision of the monastic life as one form of the Christian vocation which now must struggle to find its place alongside other expressions of Christian life, for he firmly believes that as monasticism renews itself for the Church, it will in turn renew the Church. Abbot Kline shows that monasticism can renew itself in its very essence by giving of itself for the sake of the Church. In looking to the baptized, who discern in the monastic way their own journey, monastics can find new energies for the journey ahead. Having had their own treasury blessedly looted by the baptized, the monastics find themselves loose in a world which has become more and more their place and their home. By exploring this theme of monasticism in the Church and the Church in monasticism, readers will find answers to such questions as How do we belong to the Church? and What can we give to the Church in a more obvious way? Lovers of the Place weaves together allegory, narrative, and poetic intuition, gathering images and insights around an experience of conversion to the monastic way of humility. Through his insight and experience, Abbot Kline invites all the baptized to a participation in the monastic charism now loose in the Church at large. Francis Kline, OCSO, is abbot of Mepkin, a Cistercian (Trappist) monastery near Charleston, South Carolina. He has studied at The Julliard School in New York and at the Pontifical Athenaeum Saint' Anselmo in Rome. "

Since they seem to require a very centralized conception of the Church and its administration, the decrees of Vatican I are often taken to pose problems both for ecumenical dialogue and for discussion within the Catholic Church. Hermann Pottmeyer, however, shows that the centralist interpretation of Vatican I is neither the binding nor the correct interpretation. He undertakes a careful examination both of the historical conditions that gave rise to the conception of the pope as an absolute monarch and of the Council documents themselves. Moreover, in the documents of Vatican II he finds the foundation for a vision of papal ministry understood within the context of a Church conceived in terms of "communion." This ecclesiology of communion formulated at Vatican II, taken together with a correct interpretation of the teachings of Vatican I, points the way beyond a centralist understanding of the papacy and offers the framework for a new dialogue on papal primacy.

Jesuits traces the growth of the Society of Jesus into Christendoms most powerful order. This multibiography is history with a human face, a story of remarkable individuals who flourished and struggled through changing times into the modern age. In this magisterial account, Jean Lacouture portrays the sweep of five hundred years of world history, from the dungeons of the Vatican to the jungles of South America to the royal courts of Europe and Asia. Jesuits: A Multibiography is history with a human face, the fascinating tales of men of the spirit who participated in the actions and passions of the modern world, a world bursting its seams. Be all things to all men, said the founder of the Jesuits, Ignatius of Loyola, to his followers. Go and set the world ablaze! The often picaresque story takes us to the Paris of Rabelais, where Ignatius, with a handful of his fellow students, formed what would become the Society of Jesus. We follow Francis Xavier to Japan and Matteo Ricci to China. We watch as the Society grows into Christendom's most powerful order, and as the Black Legend of a calculating, Machiavellian Jesuitry leads to its abolition in 1773 (it was restored forty years later). We see the great characters of history and culturePascal, Voltaire, Frederick the Great, Catherine the Greatplay their parts. One of Jean Lacouture's most poignant portraits is of the twentieth century's most famous and beloved Jesuit, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a scientist-priest whose humanistic conclusions put him at odds with the Church. Lacouture's wide-ranging narrative illuminates Pope John XXIII's reforms and the Jesuit-inspired liberation theology movements in Central and South America. With the papacy of John Paul II, a riveting drama unfolds as the Jesuits are brought under new constraints.

In What to Expect in Seminary, Virginia Samuel Cetuk looks at the various facets of theological education -- the call to ministry, classroom learning, community life, field education, financial realities, time-management challenges -- through the lens of spiritual formation. In each chapter she challenges readers to view the particular topic as an avenue to spiritual growth instead of as an obstacle to the same. Offering readers the conceptual tool of reframing, she draws upon psychology, Scripture, and her many years' experiences in theological education to help readers see both the challenges and the rich opportunities of theological education related to ministry and spiritual formation.

This book tells the stories of 40 hard working men and women from all walks of life who became saints by doing small things in a great way for the love of God. The author, Brother Tom-Nicholas, is a lay brother in the Franciscan th ird order and serves as liturgical assistant at St. James' Episcopal church in South Pasadena, California. He always manages to bring home the modern message of each saint in a funny yet inspirational way. From ex-lawyers and soldiers, to housewives, he rbalists, and hair-dressers, each special story has something to make you smile, maybe make you laugh, and always make you think about the simple things we can all do to make a difference. If you-'re looking for the patron saint of television, a monthly meditation series, or just a special book you can share with those you love, Calling All Saints is for you.

Contributors to this volume, all members of the Princeton Theological Seminary faculty, address the various exegetical, interpretive, and practical issues pertaining to the issue of homosexuality in the church. These include the ordination of homosexuals and the blessing of homosexual unions, as well as broader issues dealing with liturgical and theological language about God and the role of the church in a pluralistic society. The contributors speak of these various issues as theological educators, ministers, and committed Christians. They ask, What do the scriptures say about homosexuality and related issues? How should the scriptures inform our theological reflection? and How do we live faithfully in regard to this matter? And like the Christian community at large, the contributors are not of one mind on any of these issues; many times they are in considerable disagreement. Homosexuality and Christian Community will help to guide churches and individuals engaged in theological reflection about the place of homosexuals in the church.