Benedictine Options

Download or read book The Benedict Option written by Rod Dreher and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2017-03-14 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "Already the most discussed and most important religious book of the decade." —David Brooks In this controversial bestseller, Rod Dreher calls on American Christians to prepare for the coming Dark Age by embracing an ancient Christian way of life. From the inside, American churches have been hollowed out by the departure of young people and by an insipid pseudo–Christianity. From the outside, they are beset by challenges to religious liberty in a rapidly secularizing culture. Keeping Hillary Clinton out of the White House may have bought a brief reprieve from the state’s assault, but it will not stop the West’s slide into decadence and dissolution. Rod Dreher argues that the way forward is actu­ally the way back—all the way to St. Benedict of Nur­sia. This sixth-century monk, horrified by the moral chaos following Rome’s fall, retreated to the forest and created a new way of life for Christians. He built enduring communities based on principles of order, hospitality, stability, and prayer. His spiritual centers of hope were strongholds of light throughout the Dark Ages, and saved not just Christianity but Western civilization. Today, a new form of barbarism reigns. Many believers are blind to it, and their churches are too weak to resist. Politics offers little help in this spiritual crisis. What is needed is the Benedict Option, a strategy that draws on the authority of Scripture and the wisdom of the ancient church. The goal: to embrace exile from mainstream culture and construct a resilient counterculture. The Benedict Option is both manifesto and rallying cry for Christians who, if they are not to be conquered, must learn how to fight on culture war battlefields like none the West has seen for fifteen hundred years. It's for all mere Chris­tians—Protestant, Catholic, Orthodox—who can read the signs of the times. Neither false optimism nor fatalistic despair will do. Only faith, hope, and love, embodied in a renewed church, can sustain believers in the dark age that has overtaken us. These are the days for building strong arks for the long journey across a sea of night.

Download or read book Benedictine Options written by Patrick Henry and published by Liturgical Press. This book was released on 2021-09-15 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: You want insights for living? Look to people whose understandings have been practiced for fifteen hundred years. Saint Benedict and Saint Scholastica, his twin sister, established a flexible pattern that has adopted, adapted, challenged—and outlived—myriad cultures. Their sons and daughters today, who devote their time and talents to the “school for the Lord’s service” launched by the Rule of Benedict, demonstrate a whole range of options that are accessible to anyone. It is a mistake to think that “forsaking the world” is the Benedictine option. Options (plural) are, instead, “for the sake of the world.”

Download or read book Benedictine Options written by Patrick Henry and published by Liturgical Press. This book was released on 2021-09-15 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: You want insights for living? Look to people whose understandings have been practiced for fifteen hundred years. Saint Benedict and Saint Scholastica, his twin sister, established a flexible pattern that has adopted, adapted, challenged—and outlived—myriad cultures. Their sons and daughters today, who devote their time and talents to the “school for the Lord’s service” launched by the Rule of Benedict, demonstrate a whole range of options that are accessible to anyone. It is a mistake to think that “forsaking the world” is the Benedictine option. Options (plural) are, instead, “for the sake of the world.”

Download or read book Building the Benedict Option written by Leah Libresco and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2018-08-07 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Building the Benedict Option is a combination spiritual memoir and practical handbook for Christians who want to build communities of prayer, socialization, and evangelization in the places where they live and work. Beginning when the author was a new convert, she desired more communal prayer and fellowship than weekly Mass could provide. She surveyed her friends--busy, young, urban professionals like herself--and created unique enriching or supportive experiences that matched their desires and schedules. The result was a less lonely and more boisterous spiritual and social life. No Catholic Martha Stewart, Libresco is frank about how she plans events that allow her to feed thirty people on a Friday night without feeling exhausted. She is honest about the obstacles to prayer and the challenge to make it inviting and unobtrusive. Above all, she communicates the joy she has experienced since discovering ways to open her home (even when it was only a small studio apartment). The reader will close this book with four or five ideas for events to try over the next few weeks, along with the tools to make them fruitful. From film nights to picnics in the park to resume-writing evenings, there are plenty of ideas to choose from and loads of encouragement to make more room in one's life for others.

Download or read book A Rare Benedictine written by Ellis Peters and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 1989-11 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Peters has gained worldwide praise for her meticulous re-creations of 12th-century monastic life. Here, her chronicles continue with a Christmas story, a tale of robbery and attempted murder, and a narrative of Brother Cadfael's early years.

Download or read book Benedictine Sisters of St. Walburg Monastery written by Sr. Deborah Harmeling and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2012 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Presents a pictorial history of the community in Covington and Villa Hills, the schools and hospitals where the sisters worked, and the familiar faces of those who were a part of it all"--Page 4 of cover.

Download or read book Benedict's Dharma written by Patrick Henry and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2002-06-06 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: St Benedict's Rule is a set of guidelines that has governed Christian monastic life since the 6th century. Those who live according to the Rule regard it as the bedrock of their lives and feel great affection for its author. In this book four prominent Buddhist scholars turn their attention to the Rule. Through personal anecdotes, lively debate and thoughtful comparison, they reveal how the wisdom of each tradition can revitalise the other and how their own spiritual practices have been enriched through familiarity with the Rule. Their insights are written not only for Buddhists and Christians but for anyone interested in the ancient discipline of monasticism and what it might offer a materially glutted and spiritually famished culture. This book also includes a new translation of the Rule by the former Abbot of Ampleforth, Patrick Barry.