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A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AND NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR“Vivid, compelling... An embrace of moral and spiritual contemplation.” –The New York Times“A remarkable piece of writing. If read with humility and attention, Kathleen Norris's book becomes lectio divina, or holy reading.” –The Boston GlobeFrom the iconic author of Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith, a spiritual journey that brings joy to the meanings of love, grace and faith. Why would a married woman with a thoroughly Protestant background and often more doubt than faith be drawn to the ancient practice of monasticism, to a community of celibate men whose days are centered on a rigid schedule of prayer, work, and scripture? This is the question that poet Kathleen Norris asks us as, somewhat to her own surprise, she found herself on two extended residencies at St. John's Abbey in Minnesota.Part record of her time among the Benedictines, part meditation on various aspects of monastic life, The Cloister Walk demonstrates, from the rare perspective of someone who is both an insider and outsider, how immersion in the cloistered world-- its liturgy, its ritual, its sense of community-- can impart meaning to everyday events and deepen our secular lives. In this stirring and lyrical work, the monastery, often considered archaic or otherworldly, becomes immediate, accessible, and relevant to us, no matter what our faith may be.

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What does lived religion look like in the 21st century? Against the polarizations of old and new, religion and secularism, theory and practice, a cadre of internationally renowned scholars interrogate the ways spiritual ideas and practices remain transformative in contemporary society. Concepts of self, community, education, aging, love, law and morality, of inner and outer modes of action and experience, abound. The Jewish mystical tradition, especially the contemporary movement of Habad Hasidism, embodies an intersection of the particular and the universal that speaks to wider crises in the governing assumptions of western culture and scientific disciplines. These essays exemplify the kind of radical interdisciplinarity that can move through these crises and beyond them, militating against academic hegemonies through the inclusion of indigenous Hasidic voices who speak with equal authority.

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