Instruction 
Instruction on the Rule by noteworthy modern day monastics or oblates
The ultimate consequences of our choices
If we resist the advances of God’s love in this life, there is no solid reason to expect that things will be different in the next. The fear that this possibility evokes is due less to some fearsome quality in God than to the dread eventuality that our power of free choice will be seduced… Read More ›
Beating their swords into ploughshares?
Augustine, for all his pessimism about human nature, did not foresee the logical results of his thought, and in the original context, his “wars of mercy” to defend civilized order make a certain amount of sense. Always his idea is that the Church and the Christians, whatever they may do, are aiming at ultimate peace…. Read More ›
Silence and Removing Barriers
The silence of the tongue and of the imagination dissolves the barrier between ourselves and the peace of things that exist only for God and not for themselves. But the silence of all inordinate desire dissolves the barrier between ourselves and God. Then we come to live in Him alone. Thomas Merton No Man is… Read More ›
Of Silence
Let us act in conformity with that saying of the Prophet: “I said I will guard my ways lest I sin with my tongue; I have put a bridle on my mouth; I was dumb and was humbled and kept silence from good things.” Here the prophet shows that if we ought at times for… Read More ›
It is the silence of the world that is real
Those who love their own noise are impatient of everything else. They constantly defile the silence of the forests and the mountains and the sea. They bore through silent nature in every direction with their machines, for fear that the calm world might accuse them of their own emptiness. The urgency of their swift movement… Read More ›
To see the value and the beauty in ordinary things
One of the most important – and most neglected – elements in the beginnings of the interior life is the ability to respond to reality to see the value and the beauty in ordinary things to come alive to the splendor that is all around us in the creatures of God. We do not see… Read More ›
Personal Prayer Cells
The cell is above all the place where the monk encounters God. It is a physical space, yet a space ‘in accordance with the image of one’s inward nature.’… The primary tools of the cell are solitude, silence, listening, and the Spirit.(Keller, Oasis of Wisdom, p. 51) The spiritual life, however, is not limited solely… Read More ›
Be Content You Are Not A Saint
Be content that you are not yet a saint, even though you realize that the only thing worth living for is sanctity. Then you will be satisfied to let God lead you to sanctity by paths that you cannot understand. You will travel in darkness in which you will no longer be concerned with yourself… Read More ›
Turbulence of spirit is a sign of spiritual weakness
The measure of our being is not to be sought in the violence of our experiences. Turbulence of spirit is a sign of spiritual weakness. When delights spring out of our depths like leopards, we have nothing to be proud of: our soul’s life is in danger. For when we are strong, we are always… Read More ›
Thoughts on true Self
The root of personality is to be sought in the “true Self” which is manifested in the basic unification of consciousness in which subject and object are one. Hence the highest good is “the self’s fusion with the highest reality.” Human personality is regarded as the force which effects this fusion. The hopes and desires… Read More ›