The present work is a general introduction, for the modern reader, to the hermit way of life. It presents immersion in solitude both as the special vocation of some and a spiritual dimension beckoning all.
Father Cornelius Wencel, Er. Cam., was born in Gostyń, Poland, in 1964. He made his final vows as a Camaldolese hermit in 1993 and was ordained priest in 1999. He now resides at the Hermitage of "Silver Mountain" near Cracow, Poland.
Father Cornelius has published four books in Polish, and this is the first one to be translated into English. He received a doctorate in theology in 2004, successfully defending his dissertation on "The Trinitarian-Christological Perspective of Theological Anthropology in the Theodramatic of Hans Urs von Balthasar".
The author profits from the insights of Balthasar, Kierkegaard, Merton, and various contemporary Polish thinkers. Topics treated in this book include seeking God, existential openness, discipline, simplicity, contemplation, interreligious dialogue, and ecology.
| Product Review(s) |
|
|
|
|
Reviewer: Bishop David Ricken
In The Eremitic Life – Encountering God in Silence and Solitude, we find a book that is the most complete treatment of the life of a hermit (eremitic meaning a life of solitude) written in English.
The book is not only a historical study of the eremitic life in the Church, but is a deep exploration into the reasons for the life and what attracts a person to this kind of solitude.
This is a book addressed to the contemporary and modern man, with his multitude of distractions and occupations, for whom personal salvation and lure of eternal life are not on his list or priorities. The language is as modern as today’s newspaper and cogent as the most gripping novel, as it lays down the broad horizons of the life of solitude and implications of a life of intimacy with God.
|
|
|
