Cloister Talks

CLOISTER TALKS

Author JON. M SWEENEY

Publisher BRAZOS PRESS

ISBN 1-58743-268-2

Subtitled, “Learning from my friends the Monks” some might ask whatever this little book is about!  There is something here though.  Clearly the author is one of those independent kind of Christian thinkers.  Apparently he was raised in Chicago area in a very orthodox Evangelical Wheaton Christian kind of background and although, in a way, he does not appear to have viciously rebelled against it he nevertheless came to realise that there was much more to the Christian faith than the Evangelical Church has made known.  He is a seeker and his search has taken him in consideration of Medieval Christian history and he has authored quite a number of books, on St Francis of Assisi  for instance, and he is currently working on a book about Bernard and Abelard.  All rather interesting stuff for sure.  In this 2009 book we are taken along lines of thought linked with his constant perambulations to various Cistercian and Benedictine Monasteries in the USA.  The desire to ‘find God’ and a settled rest in Him seems to motivate his questionings and fellowship with various monks, none of whom became his spiritual director but became friends.  So, there is food for thought here, questions, and some answers but leaving us with further questions that are not answered and some of the monks believed cannot be answered.  The book is a kind of contemplative conversation, talks with monks set against the then current events of the authors life in his family, children, work and general sense of un-fulfilment.  At back of all is the foolishness of the present materialistic driven life of most folk.  Restlessness, superficiality and lack of love pervades and for sure the darkness deepens as far as Jesus and the True Light that He is is concerned.  There are contrasts here then, what lessons does the life of a monk teach those who are living in the busyness of twenty-first century life?  Is it possible to embrace some of the disciplines of monastic life into the rhythms of family and work?  No clear answers here, but suggestions, thoughts for those willing to ponder.  When you read a book like this you breath something of an atmosphere of the tranquility of the Word, the Unchanging God, the deep fountains of His life in contrast to the incessant and empty noise of words clanging one against the other.  So, perhaps this book will help a wee bit for the reader to realise that there is a place of quiet rest in the heart of God.  

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