Many who just can't join a monastery suspect, nonetheless, that they are somehow monks at heart. They will be thrilled by this book, in which a monk without a monastery reveals intimate glimpses of his life and convictions.

An account of the author's life as a monk outside the monastery, integrating teachings from the world's religions with his own Catholic training, combining spiritual practice with the necessities of making a living, and pursuing a course of social justice.

"I distinguish between two forms of awareness - horizontal and vertical. Vertical awareness always relates to the transcendent Mystery, while the horizontal relates to our relationships to others, whether they be people, other sentient beings, the natural world, or even the entire cosmos. Most important, horizontal and vertical awareness become integrated in the contemplative process as it matures, when we encounter the Divine in everyone and everything. And both directions display themselves in four dimensions of knowing, each implicating and reflecting the others like a hologram.
"These are the four elements present in awareness: metaphysical, epistemological, mystical, and moral dimensions - four ways of revealing, or 'translating,' the mystery of the Divine and applying it to our human condition. First, the metaphysical, as grounded in the transcendent One, is limitless vertical truth. The epistemological, or what we can know, is moment by moment a horizontal reality pointing to its vertical Source. The mystical, from the horizontal into the boundless, is the spacious verticality of the Divine. Finally, the moral combines transcendent vertical awareness with the horizontal - appropriate attitudes and actions in everyday life. In its spiritual expression, developing from its moral character, awareness is love in action, and the attributes of limitless sensitivity, kindness, compassion and mercy - actual acts of living." pp.198-9