Benedict of Nursia, often known as Saint Benedict, was an Italian Christian monk, writer, and theologian who is venerated in the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, the Anglican Communion, and Old Catholic Churches. He is a patron saint of Europe.
The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict, are a monastic religious order of the Catholic Church following the Rule of Saint Benedict. They are also sometimes called the Black Monks, in reference to the colour of their religious habits. They were founded in 529 by Benedict of Nursia, a 6th-century monk who laid the foundations of Benedictine monasticism through the formulation of his Rule.
A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone (hermits). A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer which may be a chapel, church, or temple, and may also serve as an oratory, or in the case of communities anything from a single building housing only one senior and two or three junior monks or nuns, to vast complexes and estates housing tens or hundreds. A monastery complex typically comprises a number of buildings which include a church, dormitory, cloister, refectory, library, balneary and infirmary, and outlying granges. Depending on the location, the monastic order and the occupation of its inhabitants, the complex may also include a wide range of buildings that facilitate self-sufficiency and service to the community. These may include a hospice, a school, and a range of agricultural and manufacturing buildings such as a barn, a forge, or a brewery.
Bede Griffiths OSB Cam, born Alan Richard Griffiths and also known by the end of his life as Swami Dayananda, was a British-born priest and Benedictine monk who lived in ashrams in South India and became a noted yogi. Griffiths was a part of the Christian Ashram Movement.
The term world community is used primarily in political and humanitarian contexts to describe an international aggregate of nation states of widely varying types. In most connotations, the term is used to convey meanings attached to consensus or inclusion of all people in all lands and their governments.
In Christianity, an oblate is a person who is specifically dedicated to God and to God's service.
Christian meditation is a form of prayer in which a structured attempt is made to become aware of and reflect upon the revelations of God. The word meditation comes from the Latin word meditārī, which has a range of meanings including to reflect on, to study, and to practice. Christian meditation is the process of deliberately focusing on specific thoughts and reflecting on their meaning in the context of the love of God.
In Western Christianity, Lectio Divina is a traditional monastic practice of scriptural reading, meditation and prayer intended to promote communion with God and to increase the knowledge of God's word. In the view of one commentator, it does not treat Scripture as texts to be studied, but as the living word.
Downside Abbey is a Benedictine monastery in England and the senior community of the English Benedictine Congregation. Until 2019, the community had close links with Downside School, for the education of children aged eleven to eighteen. Both the abbey and the school are at Stratton-on-the-Fosse, between Westfield and Shepton Mallet in Somerset, South West England. In 2020, the monastic community announced that it would move away from the present monastery and seek a new place to live. On 27 October 2021, the monastic community further announced that as part of their transition they would move in Spring of 2022 to the temporary accommodation of "Southgate House, in the grounds of Buckfast Abbey, Devon, where we will live as the Community of St Gregory the Great". As of 2020, the monastic community of Downside Abbey was home to fifteen monks.
John Douglas Main OSB was a Roman Catholic priest and Benedictine monk who presented a way of Christian meditation which used a prayer-phrase or mantra. In 1975, Main began Christian meditation groups which met at Ealing Abbey, his monastery in West London, England, and, later, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. These were the origins of the ecumenical network of Christian meditation groups which have become the World Community for Christian Meditation (WCCM).
Ealing Abbey is a Catholic Benedictine monastic foundation on Castlebar Hill in Ealing. It is part of the English Benedictine Congregation. As of 2020, the Abbey had 14 monks.
Laurence Freeman OSB is an English Benedictine monk and Catholic priest. He belongs to the Monastery of Sta Maria di Pilastrello, in Italy, of the Congregation of Monte Oliveto Maggiore. He is the Director of the World Community for Christian Meditation (WCCM), Prior of its Benedictine Oblate community and also Director of Bonnevaux, the International centre of the WCCM in France.
New Monasticism is a diverse movement, not limited to a specific religious denomination or church and including varying expressions of contemplative life. These include evangelical Christian communities such as "Simple Way Community" and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove's "Rutba House," European and Irish new monastic communities, such as that formed by Bernadette Flanagan, spiritual communities such as the "Community of the New Monastic Way" founded by feminist contemplative theologian Beverly Lanzetta, and "interspiritual" new monasticism, such as that developed by Rory McEntee and Adam Bucko. These communities expand upon traditional monastic wisdom, translating it into forms that can be lived out in contemporary lives "in the world."
Zoketsu Norman Fischer is an American poet, writer, and Soto Zen priest, teaching and practicing in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki. He is a Dharma heir of Sojun Mel Weitsman, from whom he received Dharma transmission in 1988. Fischer served as co-abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center from 1995–2000, after which he founded the Everyday Zen Foundation in 2000, a network of Buddhist practice group and related projects in Canada, the United States and Mexico. Fischer has published more than twenty-five books of poetry and non-fiction, as well as numerous poems, essays and articles in Buddhist magazines and poetry journals.
David Steindl-Rast OSB is an Austrian-American Catholic Benedictine monk, author, and lecturer. He is committed to interfaith dialogue and has dealt with the interaction between spirituality and science.
Sara Grant, RSCJ was a British Indologist, Christian missionary, and one of the pioneers of interreligious dialogue in the twentieth century. She came to India in 1956, as a missionary and member of the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, became actively engaged in interreligious dialogue in India. In time, she became a leading figure in the inculturation movement that was started in India by Roman Catholic priest Fr Richard De Smet, SJ in the early 1970s, with whom she was closely associated with. Her association with Swami Abhishiktananda, further led to working on the Advaita Vedanta (Nondualism) teachings of Hindu philosopher Adi Sankara, as revealed in her spiritual autobiography, Towards an Alternative Theology: Confessions of a Non-dualist Christian (1991).
The Canadian Christian Meditation Community (CCMC) is part of the World Community for Christian Meditation (WCCM), which was founded in 1991 to foster the teachings of Benedictine monk and priest, Fr. John Main, O.S.B. (1926–1982). Fr. Main taught a way of Christian meditation which he based on parallels he saw between the spiritual practice taught by Desert Father John Cassian and the meditative practice he had been taught by the Swami Satyanandain in Kuala Lumpur. In 1977, Fr. John started a small Benedictine community in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, thus bringing this form of contemplative prayer to Canada. The Canadian Community's national office is located in Montreal.
Monastic silence is a spiritual practice recommended in a variety of religious traditions for purposes including facilitation of approaching deity, and achieving elevated states of spiritual purity. It may be in accordance with a monk's formal vow of silence, but can also engage laity who have not taken vows, or novices who are preparing to take vows. Monastic silence is more highly developed in the Roman Catholic faith than in Protestantism, but it is not limited to Catholicism. The practice has a corresponding manifestation in the Orthodox church, which teaches that silence is a means to access God, to develop self-knowledge, or to live more harmoniously. Theophilus, patriarch of Alexandria, placed the virtue of silence on par with the faith itself in a synodal letter from AD 400. "Monks—if they wish to be what they are called—will love silence and the Catholic faith, for nothing at all is more important than these two things."
Tantur Ecumenical Institute is an international ecumenical institute for advanced theological research in Jerusalem.
Leo Dennis Lefebure is an American Roman Catholic priest of the Archdiocese of Chicago, university professor, and author. He is the inaugural Matteo Ricci S. J. Chair of Theology at Georgetown University.
