"Discover your truest hungers and your deepest spiritual reserves as Christine Paintner, aka The Online Abbess, shares 6 unique fasts helping reveal harmful patterns and re-orienting us toward nourishing fulfillment. Drawing on desert wisdom and contemplative practice, Paintner helps us enter our own journey of spiritual growth"--
Christine Valters Paintner, abbess of Abbey of the Arts, introduces us to the spiritual practice of breath prayer and offers beautiful poem-prayers for walking, working, dressing, cleaning, sitting in silence, doing the dishes, living in community--breathing the divine into our daily lives.
Timeless and contemplative sayings from the earliest Christian sages of desert spirituality can be a companion on your own spiritual journey. The desert fathers and mothers were ordinary Christians living in solitude in the deserts of Egypt, Palestine, Syria and Arabia who chose to renounce the world in order to deliberately and individually follow God's call. They embraced lives of celibacy, labor, fasting, prayer and poverty, believing that denouncing material goods and practicing stoic self-discipline would lead to unity with the Divine. Their spiritual practice formed the basis of Western monasticism and greatly influenced both Western and Eastern Christianity. Their writings, first recorded in the fourth century, consist of spiritual advice, parables and anecdotes emphasizing the primacy of love and the purity of heart. Focusing on key themes of charity, fortitude, lust, patience, prayer and self-control, the Sayings influenced the rule of St. Benedict and have inspired centuries of opera, poetry and art. This probing and personal SkyLight Illuminations edition opens up their wisdom for readers with no previous knowledge of Western monasticism and early Christianity. It provides insightful yet unobtrusive commentary that describes historical background, explains the practice of asceticism and illustrates how you can use their wisdom to energize your spiritual quest.