How would you explain monasticism to Protestants who feel Christians should be out in the world, seeking to convert lost souls? To them, monks/nuns are hiding from society’s ills, not helping to mend ...

SNOWMASS, Colo. — In an interview with a local TV station, Thomas Keating, famous spiritual writer and contemplative at St. Benedict’s Monastery here, told the reporter that his family vehemently ...

Our world seems to be increasingly fractured. Sadly, our Church is becoming increasingly fractured as well. We’re still reeling from the festering wound of the sexual abuse crisis. We’ve seen recent ...

When Judith Valente, a Benedictine oblate, leads contemplative retreats both online and in monasteries around the country, she has been noticing that laypeople — whether Catholic or ...

Many Catholics and Protestants are looking back to Benedict for the community and spiritual intensity they can’t find in modern culture. Christians struggling for sanctity in a too-comfortable world ...

We were about a half mile from the monastery, hoeing weeds out of the pumpkin patch. The late-June sun of Iowa beat down upon Hal and me, and sweat streamed down our faces. Our shirts and shoes were ...

Much copy and debate has been generated by the Pew Foundation's recent snapshot of American religion. A lot of the conversation has sounded like the daily roundup of a religious stock market: who is ...

FUJIMI, Japan — At 8 a.m. prompt, a single soft electronic bell rings once and the eight men assembled in the small, sunlit chapel rise in unison. Dressed in the black habits of Benedictine monks, ...

The monastic alternative, at least in the West, has become so deeply unfashionable that most people no longer consider the possibility, but there is, at least to me, something deeply appealing about ...

Sr. Jincy Othottil poses for a photo in front of the Chaldean Syrian Higher Secondary School in Kerala, India, where she is the manager. Othottil in 1998 dedicated herself to the lost monastic life in ...