Outstanding spiritual memoir

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	• The Monks of Mount Athos: A Western Monk's Extraordinary Spiritual Journey on Eastern Holy Ground M. Basil Pennington Skylight Paths Publishing, 2003 - 305 pages average customer review:based on 2 reviews view larger image
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Silent mind, Christ mind

Twenty-five years ago, Cistercian monk Basil Pennington, who recently died from injuries sustained in an automobile accident, spent a sabbatical on Mount Athos, the holy mountain of Eastern Orthodoxy. This was and remains an unusual feat: pilgrims are generally not allowed to spend more than a night or two at any one of the monasteries and sketes on Athos. Moreover, members of the Latin Church are generally not all that welcome on Athos anyway.

But Pennington, who although a Latinist was also a member of a contemplative monastic tradition, managed to spend four months on Athos. Most of his time was spent at the monastery of Simonos Petras, but he also visited quite a few others. He was welcomed at Simonos warmly and generously. At some of the other monasteries he visited, the hospitality was decidedly more wary. Throughout the entire experience, Pennington entered as deeply as an outsider can into the Orthodox spiritual tradition, attending services (when permitted), praying the Jesus Prayer, and absorbing the holy atmosphere and history of Athos. His journey of the experience, in which he recounts both the everyday and the spiritual, was originally published in 1978. This edition is a reprint, with a new (but very brief) preface by Pennington.

Although I enjoy reading Pennington (who was a prolific author), he's no Thomas Merton. Many of his books offer rather commonplace--albeit solid--spiritual advice. There's little of the wisdom or breathtaking insight one encounters in Merton. _The Monks of Mount Athos_ is no exception. Much of it is rather pedestrian description--although, since the description is about the lives of monks on Athos, it's interesting for the most part (although also repetitious in places). The book's spiritual reflections tend to focus on Pennington's quest to enter more deeply into silence--what the Eastern Orthodox tradition calls heyschia--in the conviction that mental silence creates a place for the presence of Christ to reveal itself.

Pennington's memoir of his stay on Athos is worth reading, but I'm not sure it merits a close reading. It is, however, a book in which the mystery of the spiritual life, and the difficulty of attaining silence, come through clearly.

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Outstanding spiritual memoir

In the 1970s, the trappist father Basil took a long retreat at Mt. Athos. It was the 25th anniversary of his profession among the Cistercians, and he felt a need to take some time to examine his progress and whether or not there was too much activity in his life. This book chronicles the several months he stayed at
Athos, and is also a great look at the monks, themselves, as met and observed by a western monk. Fr. Basil's humility, willingness to put himself last, gentleness in the face of a few rude anticatholic monks is quite moving. And the faith and goodness of the vast majority of monks he met was just so edifying and wonderful. I found this book to be excellent both as from a spiritual standpoint, and as a quick look at some of the differences and between the Eastern and Western church. I hadn't realized how different some of the beliefs are, or how angry some of the East is (perhaps rightly so, in some cases). So I found this book very enlightening. I recommend it to anyone with an interest in Mt. Athos, spiritual seeking, prayer.

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Twenty-five years ago, M. Basil Pennington, ocso, was the first Western monk to live on Mount Athos for more than the usually permitted overnight visit. The Monks of Mount Athos chronicles his extraordinary stay, his experiences of the East, and lively conversations with his hosts about theological differences and unfamiliar spiritual practices.

Listen in as Abbot Basil wrestles with historical differences between Christianity?s East and West, learns the Orthodox practice of "the prayer of the heart," and explores the landscape, the monastic communities, and the food of Athos--a monastic republic like no other place on earth. New to this edition, Archimandrite Dionysios, a monk from "the Holy Mountain," reflects on the ecumenical openness fostered as a result of, and since, Abbot Basil?s stay.

The abbot?s experiences on Mount Athos motivated him to re-examine his role as a monk and his relationship to God. His inspiring meditations will help you to explore your own relationship to God and to others.

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