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How to Be a Monastic and Not Leave Your Day Job: An Invitation to Oblate Life (Voices from the Monastery)
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$ 12.79
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| Item Number |
122087 |
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Item Description...
Dorothy Day was an oblate while she lived in the heart of New York City. So was the French poet, Paul Claudel. Kathleen Norris is an oblate, and so was Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia, the first woman in Europe to earn a Ph.D. What connects them all? There are at least ten thousand oblates in the United States today (no one knows for sure how many), and each of them is connected in meaningful ways to a monastery or abbey. Most oblates are ordinary lay people from various Christian traditions. They are linked together by common appreciation for the Rule of St. Benedict. Originally written for monks, the principles in the Rule may be applied by everyone else---and in today's hectic, changing world, being an oblate offers a rich spiritual connection to the stability and wisdom of monastic life. This essential guide explains how people who live and work in "the world" are still invited to balance work with prayer, cultivate interdependence with others, practice hospitality, and otherwise practice their spirituality like monks. |
Item Specifications...
Pages 119
Dimensions: Length: 0.5" Width: 5.5" Height: 8"
Weight: 0.4 lbs.
Binding Softcover
Release Date Feb 1, 2006
Publisher Paraclete Press (MA)
ISBN 1557254494
EAN 9781557254498
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Availability 4 units.
Availability accurate as of May 23, 2012 04:50.
Usually ships within one to two business days from Momence, IL.
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Reviews - What do our customers think?
 | The Opposite Of What It Intended Jan 22, 2009 |
I really wanted to like this book. But as I got into it, I realized that this really isn't going to help in my inquiry into the Benedictine Oblates. Quite the contrary, it raised more questions than it answered.
First off, it really is light read. At 111 pages, it only took me an afternoon to complete it. It is NOT a guide to being a monastic while living in the world. It's more of a sales kit than a how-to. The main problem arises when you take a cold, hard look at the sales pitch itself. Here are just a couple of examples:
The author quotes Sr. Joan Chittister a couple of times. I found this use of the spokesnun of Call to Action a bit disturbing given her distance from the teachings of the Church. There also seem to be more quotes from non-Catholic Oblates than from Catholics. This may not seem like a big deal, but the overall impression is that evangelization has been trumped by ecumenism in the OSB, and left this reader with a vaguely universalist tinge with regards to Benedictine beliefs. (Again, this is an impression of my own, not a specific statement made by the author.) Further, the author tacitly agrees with the implied criticism that the Benedictines have become rather liberal and radical. His defense of this point is most disheartening; we have to be orthodox because we've been around so long.
A point at which the game is given away comes late in the book. The author writes:
"What is Benedict's charism? Unlike Francis, he wasn't a troubadour. Nor was he a brain like Dominic, a Doctor of Theology. Benedict dropped out of high school. Nor did he have the drive of that ambitious missionary and reformer, Ignatius of Loyola. Benedict was common, and the Rule of Benedict is ordinary."
This doesn't strike me as a serious definition of a charism, and leads me to wonder if this monk of 30+ years can even define the charism of the Benedictines at all. If you're ever going to define it in a concise way, this is the place to do it. I don't intend this as a mean-spirited attack on the author, but rather to point out a rather loose thought process throughout the book. (And it seems very odd to define the charism simply as ordinariness. It's a nice sentiment, but it's hardly a well defined charism.)
All in all, this book seems to have done the exact opposite of what it intended. Rather than giving me a decent guide to living a monastic life while remaining in the world, or even closing the sales pitch and enticing me to join, it has called into question whether I want to become an Oblate at all. | | |  | Benedictine Oblateship Jan 21, 2009 |
| Br Benet offers a clear description of Benedictine Oblateship. It starts well with care and thoroughness but the thought and quality diminishes about half way, and becomes a guide book with constant references to Bendedict and Oblateship. As a book to recommend to those aspiring to being an oblate it is helpful if they can overcome the repetitious nature of themes in the last half of the book. With that in mind, and being aware that universalism is really at the heart of the writing, be prepared for a light read. | | | | not well-grounded in the real world outside of the monastery Oct 5, 2008 |
This book is written by a brother who has lived in a monastery for many years and really hasn't a clue as to how to actually APPLY monastic principles in the real world. He makes the effort to bridge that gap by quoting, too often, from oblates he surveyed or has spoken with. Still, he misses the mark.
It's certainly better than The Inner Room book by Mark Plaiss, a non-monastic living in the real world, but it still leaves a huge gap between monasticism and actually applying it to the real, everyday world.
Don't buy it; get it from the library. Don't rely on it for the best source of information as to how to apply monasticism to your real world. At best, you might glean from it an idea or two, but nothing more than that.
The subtitle of this book should have been it's main title. It's not as much about "how to be a monastic and not leave your day job" as it is about becoming a benedictine oblate with a specific monastery.
If you're looking for a manual about how to become a benedictine oblate and what that might mean, this book offers some help. However, if you're looking for a book about how to REALLY be a monastic without leaving your day job, best to pass on this one, or read it for just an idea here or there.
Don't expect much; this book leaves you wanting a LOT more. | | |  | Shallow Enough to Wade Into at the Beginning Apr 8, 2008 |
| I am a convert not anywhere near a monastery and not ready for oblate life who has only known one benedictine for a short period of time. While the emphasis on community and oblate life within the confines of a monastery is rightly there, this short book has introduced me to a new approach and a philosophy of life that is as refreshing as it was unexpected. While it doesn't include the rule, it includes simple concepts -- enough to keep me busy, questioning, reordering my days, and embracing a kind of peace unusual in this current day's pace. I would also highly recommend a book called Oblation: Meditations on St. Benedict's Rule. It is a collection of poetry born as a reaction to various parts and concepts contained in Benedict's Rule. | | | | Benedictine Oblate Jan 24, 2008 |
I guess I didn't read the introduction when I purchased the book otherwise I might have known that in order to become a Monastic you first must become a Benedictine. That's a tongue in cheek comment by the way.
There is the Oblate's in the Benedictine world and "Third Order of St. Francis" in the Franciscan order, both provide a somewhat structured method of achieving some sort of normalcy in a hectic world. The Oblates of St. Benedict is a unique group in that every Benedictine Monastery has a Oblate group. The interesting thing about being a Oblate is that you do not need to be a Catholic in order to join. In my own experience as well as my wife's, we have been Oblates for nearly ten years at a Monastery in Arkansas. There isn't much that they ask you to do except for praying the "Liturgy of the Hours," and following the writing of St. Benedict in his "Rules" book. Depending on the Oblate Director at the Monastery, your participation in their community as an Oblate can be done twice a year at a retreat.
So I guess that If you learn anything from the book is that you can be a part of the community of Christ by praying and being a good person with the help of a local Benedictine Monastery. I would suggest to visit a Monastery, any Monastery, because all of them are founded on the same principle that each visitor is treated "as if Christ Himself came to the door!" Which is the primary principle of St. Benedicts Rule. | | | Write your own review about How to Be a Monastic and Not Leave Your Day Job: An Invitation to Oblate Life (Voices from the Monastery)
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