Tantalus and the Pelican: Exploring Monastic Spirituality Today [Paperback]

I read this book in two days flat, and if I hadn't had to go to work I'd have read it in one sitting. Nicholas Buxton was one of the participants on the TV programme 'The Monastery'. This book relates his spiritual journey in a very unindulgent way, and how he went from hanging out on a boat, doing nothing in particular except drinking too much, to seeking spirituality in India and finally in Western Christian monasteries. He is currently training to be a priest.

What I loved about this book is that it echoes the lives of so many people I know who grew up in the '60s or '70s, who ended up in India or elsewhere in the East, desperately searching for what the institutional church was failing to offer them. Then years later, having practiced meditation from a young age, they suddenly encounter contemplative Christianity and realise that what they had been searching for was there all the time in the Church, albeit hidden far out of sight of Sunday services.

For anyone who has dabbled with Buddhism, Hinduism or any other Eastern religion, and found that they love the practices and cultures they have learned but nevertheless struggle with a vague sense of dissatisfaction at remaining an outsider, this is the book for you. Nicholas has a rare gift of being an experienced meditator who has entered into profound depths of understanding through his own experience of meditation/prayer but who can also write with clarity, simplicity and insight about his experiences in a way that any Buddhist or Christian would appreciate. He talks about issues like truth, commitment and doubt in a wonderfully honest and undogmatic way that shows true humility. He also writes a lot about the Desert Fathers and the monastic movement and why it's anything but an easy cop-out.

Nicholas is a great writer, with a natural poetic flow, and although there are a couple of passages where he seems a little repetitive in trying to get his point across, this seems to be an expression of his own sheer wonder at what he's found - it's as if he has to keep saying the same things in different ways for fear that he won't communicate sufficiently the wonder of what he's discovered.

If you're going on a short break and want to read something inspiring and profound which is also a breeze to read, this is just the thing. Or if you are struggling with a degree of cultural alienation as a Buddhist, then reading this may help you to realise that Christianity is a truly profound path if you only know where to look. Not that Nicholas is trying to push any religious path in particular, just describing where he's at and what has led him there.

Very highly recommended.

Absolutely fantastic! The book has the perfect mixture of facts (about the history behind the monasteries) but also personal accounts of the authors time spent in various monasteries and the effect each had on him which adds depth to the book. It is well written, therefore easy to read and follow. The book contains alot of facts but its not put across in such a way that you feel overwhelmed and can't take it in, plus as said above the persoanl annecdotes make the facts come alive. Also contained is some of the authors past and how the experiences with monasticism shaped his life. I would not say you had to be religious as such to enjoy and get alot from this book, I personally am religious (Anglican) but I still think its worth a read even if you do not consider yourself 'religious'. Thoroughly enjoyable - I read it over just two evenings, I couldn't put it down! I highly reccomend it.

This book presents a very readable mix of history and thoughts on the monastic life coupled with Nicholas Buxton's own journey of faith that has taken him from alcoholism through Eastern religions (experiencing Hindu and Buddhist life in the Far East), through being in a TV "reality show" where five people spent 40 days in a monastery, through a month at the most austere monastery, Parkminister, and finally to training to be a priest in the Anglican Church.

The book opens with a brief history of the birth of monasticism in the desert. It then switches to Nicholas's early life at boarding school, after which he spent 10 years aimlessly (and mostly jobless) wandering and drinking. After loosing a friend who drowned after drinking too much Nicholas sold what he had and went to India, becoming exposed to Hinduism. Here he experienced a conversion, "a cracking of the hard but brittle shell of who we think we are" and his goal became focussed on the spiritual journey. Later Nicholas moved to New Zealand and spent 6 months in a Buddhist monastery. Here he makes the observation that monastic life is the most "normal" life possible because it is trying to live our our natural calling. Anthony of the Desert was described as having a `singleness of heart', a one-ness of purpose and life. Monks do not have a `home-life', a `family-life', a `spiritual-life' - they have their life with a single focus.

Nicholas has a simple, but I think insightful, view that all religion is a response to a deep-down knowing that something is not quite right in the world - something is missing that all the ambition and acquisition in the world does not satisfy.

Evagrius's eight thoughts (later to become the seven deadly sins) are discussed: gluttony, lust, avarice, sadness, anger, acedia, vanity & pride. As one is conquered then it opens up the danger of another (with pride the last danger of having conquered all others). Evagrius called these `thoughts' or `demons' and Nicholas draws a connection between `demon possession' and `thoughts which occupy our mind'. The Benedictine approach is also wary of dangers of extreme ascetism (which can be vainglorious) - the monk should have a choice of two dishes so that he may always eat what he prefers.

The mixture of prayer and work is discussed, with the observation that work is an extension of prayer. As St. Benedict instructed "Regard all utensils as if they were the sacred vessels of the altar". Another key aspect of Benedictine monasticism is community living - learning to see ourselves truthfully through interaction with others. This was a key element of the BBC series "The Monastery" that Nicholas was part of - five very different men sharing in monastic living for 40 days.

I appreciated Nicholas's description of `stability' and how it transfers from monastic life into our everyday lives:

Having stability implies engaging fully with the situation at hand, persevering in the face of obstacles and in spite of what might appear to be more appealing prospects. Stability is about being centred remaining focussed and undistracted.

Nicholas recounts his month in Parkminster, the Carthusian monastery that has a very austere way of life - including three hours of prayers starting at midnight. He talks of the challenge of the silence and how difficult it is to be "be here". I appreciated a point he made that detachment is not just from material things, or even detachment from owning our time and life, but he suggested that we need to grow in our detachment from the past (thinking about things gone) and the future (fantasising of how things might be in the future). Only when we are detached from the past and the future are we really present in the moment. Places such as Parkminister create an environment where the monks can slowly rid themselves of these attachments, in the silence of their cells, and embrace their true selves and so embrace the true reality of who they are. As Nicholas observes Parkminster raises the stakes in everything - either their life is complete nonsense, or it makes perfect sense.

The book ends with some thoughts on faith - that it is not a set of intellectual doctrines that must be accepted, but that it is a narrative that is embraced (sometimes in doubt and uncertainty) as the underlying basis for how one lives and what choices one makes. Faith must therefore be lives to be understood.