The Cloister Walk

Rating:
Summary: An intriguing diary that calls up many questions
Review: When Kathleen Norris found her life in a shambles, she sought shelter in the cloistered world of the Benedictines. She never details the specific problems that led to her quest for renewed faith in God. Although she has joined the monastery as an oblate--unlike the monks and nuns, she can leave to resume her married life and her book tours--she nevertheless feels that she has penetrated to the core of the monastic experience. Her descriptions of what the liturgy means to her, what the companionship of celibate men and women has given her, show us what has kept the Catholic monastery alive for nearly two thousand years. The topics of faith and spirituality, God and religion, monastic service and celibacy are interpreted through her own experience. She writes movingly and convincingly of her own feelings and thoughts, but I am left wondering just what it was that drove a married Protestant woman of middle age, who confesses to a "checkered past," to seek haven in monasteries. Surely her life's experiences color her perceptions and interpretations of cloistered Catholicism. In addition, she identifies herself as a poet, and she is a conspicuous participant in many rituals as she walks ahead of hundreds of monks to begin the reading for a service. Her anecdotes and quotations beautifully present the understanding she has gained, but how close is that to what the lifetime monks and nuns experience?