World Without End

September 4, 2017
Keating, a Cistercian monk of St. Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass, Colo. and founder of the Centering Prayer movement, sits down for an interview with writer and film producer Verboven (The Dominican Way) in this slim, dense, and instructive book that also includes an interview with Catholic philosopher Boyle. Throughout the conversation, which is transcribed directly from the interview recordings, Verboven probes Keating about his spiritual journey, the process of awakening, and the nature of death in relation to God. Verboven begins with his spiritual journey but moves quickly to deeper discussions of Centering Prayer as a method of orientation, happiness and suffering, life after death, and cosmology. In the last third of the book, Verboven elicits history about the monastery and about “centering prayer in an uncentred time” from Catholic philosopher Boyle. Readers interested in the Order of Saint Benedict or Catholics seeking greater understanding of the spiritual impulse will find much to appreciate.