The Abbey Up the Hill: A Year in the Life of a Monastic Day-Tripper [Paperback]

Carol Bonomo (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 2002

Artist, crafter, diarist, recovering alcoholic, Episcopal, Catholic, spiritual gypsy. These are some of the ways that Carol Bonomo has described herself. Like many of her generation, she had trouble finding a spiritual home. "I'm one of those 'seekers' who doesn't know what she's looking for, and wouldn't recognize an answer to the meaning of life if she tripped on it in the dark."

Her spiritual adventures included the Catholic Church, the Episcopal Church, Alcoholics Anonymous, and her attempt to become a lay associate of the Franciscans. But the Franciscans sent her away. "Run, don't walk, to the abbey up the hill, " they advised her. And so she did, heading to the Benedictine abbey she was pointed to. Much to her surprise, there she found the home she'd been seeking for so long.

The Abbey Up the Hill is Bonomo's reflection on her first year as a Benedictine oblate-a lay person vowing to live according to the 6th century Rule of St. Benedict, a monastic guide to living a balanced life with God at the center. Month-by-month, she records her spiritual growth with honesty, humor, and insight. This is the unforgettable story of a pilgrim's struggles to leave off wandering and finally come home.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Bonomo's month-by-month journal of a year among Benedictine monks invites comparison with Kathleen Norris's 1996 award-winning bestseller, The Cloister Walk, though the two books differ markedly in tone and content. Both authors are middle-aged, married oblates (vowed laypersons) in the Order of St. Benedict. But while Norris's wide-ranging essays may idealize monasticism, Bonomo's reflections spare no one, taking aim at boring homilies, inadequate hospitality, polyurethane upholstery and, above all, her own self-described crankiness. Yet Bonomo, an overscheduled speechwriter, clearly loves St. Augustine's Abbey, where for several days each month she makes a personal retreat. Her lifelong rootlessness no longer appeals to her: "I seem to have been born slamming doors shut behind me and then wondering where everybody went." Tired of false starts and sudden endings, she doggedly pursues stability, a hallmark of the Benedictine vow. Throughout, Bonomo deftly interweaves her personal story her alcoholism, her father's sudden death, her persistent fear of being an outsider with cryptic tales from the fourth-century desert fathers and mothers, principles from the 20th-century Twelve Step movement and wisdom from all 73 chapters of the sixth-century Rule of St. Benedict. As in a good novel, her character develops believably. Without forsaking her acerbic wit, Bonomo eventually finds a father figure in the kindly nonagenarian abbot, a home in the abbey and its Rule, and the beginnings of stability: "This year, for once, I stayed still." A down-to-earth spiritual journey memoir, this book is also a painless introduction to the Rule of St. Benedict.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

About the Author

Carol Bonomo is a lobbyist and speechwriter for a state university in southern California. Since 1998 she has been a Benedictine Oblate. She lives with her husband in San Marcos, California.

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Morehouse Pub Co (August 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0819219126
• ISBN-13: 978-0819219121
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,458,271 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Chasing the Choices by Tagging Along, September 23, 2002

By 

Sylvia (Indianapolis, Indiana USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Abbey Up the Hill: A Year in the Life of a Monastic Day-Tripper (Paperback)

I wasn't sure I'd like this book. Raised Catholic but no longer practicing, and not much of a seeker after things spiritual, I had little in common with the author but being a speechwriter and having a couple of friends who were helped by Alcoholics Anonymous. So, why read it? I'm curious about how people go about finding meaning and purpose in life -- whether in real life or in fiction, whether in religion or therapy, whatever it takes. In this quest to follow someone's personal journey to find meaning, I was not disappointed. As the author "chases the choices laid out for her" by her spiritual guide, Abbott Antony, I was drawn in by her disarming honesty about herself. The confessional nature of the book, however, is not expressed in a self-indulgent way. Far from it! The disarmingly honest moments are humorously self-deprecating in a way that I found more refreshing and engaging than Kathleen Norris's account of her sojourn with the Benedictines in Cloister Walk. With Abbey up the Hill, even if you know next to nothing about the Rule of St. Benedict, the Twelve Steps in AA, Episcopalians, or any of the other touchstones the author uses to fulfill her self-described "need to put things into her own words in order to trust them," you will not be lost in allusions, or illusions (for that matter), for long. While a chapter may begin with a reflection on a passage in the Rule that does not seem very clear at first, her journey through memory to find meaning or relevance to her own life never fails to draw you in and take you along. Even obscure allusions or difficult-to-comprehend Biblical passages, which may be off-putting at first, gradually become illumined as the author searches for, or sometimes seemingly stumbles upon, just the right metaphor or anecdote to make the meaning clear. It is her grasp of metaphor and analogy that I admired most. Her metaphors are not designed to impress us with their cleverness but seem to appear to her mind's eye as though a lamp comes on unbidden to elucidate self-discovery. Through her self-disclosures, you feel you're experiencing the journey to understanding along with her as you follow her thought processes. The symbolism she chooses seems ever so precise in characterizing the new insight gained. As she searches for understanding in her own "remembered-in-tranquillity" mistakes, misjudgments, and missteps, your understanding takes shape in step with hers. Advice: Don't be stalled by allusions that aren't clear at first. Persevere. By the end of the chapter, the point will be clear. She gets you there every time. In short, I recommend this book very highly.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Spirituality for the Rest of Us, September 12, 2002

By 

Nancy K. Olmsted (Providence, RI United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Abbey Up the Hill: A Year in the Life of a Monastic Day-Tripper (Paperback)

Carol Bonomo has written a book for "the rest of us!" I have a lot of books on the spiritual life. Some of them are enlightening; some are even helpful. Most of them leave me with the feeling that the author has never stuggled with the problems of my life Not so with this book.

Bonomo uses both her personal journal and the Rule of St. Benedict to frame her spiritual journey. It is easy to follow her during the year as she makes her way "day-tripping" up to her local Benedictine abey. She engagingly weaves personal story, memories and her experiences as an oblate into a narrative that is intensely personal and yet deeply engaged with her chosen path: the Rule of St. Benedict.

For those unfamiliar with the Rule, this focus will be new and may therefore may occasionally seem strange or artificial. Why all the bother to focus on and struggle with one particular such way to God? The Rule of St. Bendict is not complicated, however, and the concepts would prjobably be familiar to anyone likely to pick up this book in the first place. Bonomo's real strength is that she does struggle. She takes this stuff seriously, and she invites us to take it seriously, too. Ultimately, this engaged me because, as Bonomo herself recognizes, the Rule points to Christ. To take it seriously and struggle to observe it is therefore to take Christ seriously and begin to participate in a fully Christian existence. There is real engagement here, and it shows in every page.

This is a very personal book which is nevertheless not ultimately about the author. I appreciated Bonomo's honesty and openess in talking about her struggles with alcholism, the death of her faither, and her sometimes wandering church life. Bomono makes no attempt to artifically smooth the rough edges of life. She obviously believes that God is not to found through generalities, but rather in the day to day struggle. Her growing commitment to and understanding of the Rule provides space for here personal story to also deepen and grow. Bonomo is searching for a way to understand herself and the world. I found it fascinating to watch Bonomo encounter Christ in this way. I am neither Roman Catholic nor a Benedictine myself, but I could see a lot of myself in all of this. I suspect this is because this book is ultimately about learning to see beyond self to the Christ in others. I think others may see that, too.

If this book has any fault, at least for me, it is perhaps less a fault than a limitation. The Rule and this particular Abey obviously helped Bonomo make an important spiritual transition. This does not mean than she idealizes this particular abey, although she is certainly grateful to Abot Anthony for his help. It does means, however, that Bonomo sometimes writes like any new convert. This can be very engaging and Bonomo is certainly not blind to faults, hers or anyone elses. Still, it brought back the early Thomas Merton for me. This book sometimes has a similar freshness, and, perhaps, at times, a similar lack of perspective. The Merton of the Seven Story Mountain was not the same Merton as the person who wrote the Asian Journals. Readers of Esther de Waal will not find here the ease and sophistication of someone fully conversant with the Benedictine tradition and its role in the western Church.

On the other hand, I personally hope Bonomo never looses the her freshness and sense of discovery. I really liked this book. I highly recommend it. It is serious. It is funny. It is personal. It is written by someone who has the soul of an artist without being at all "artsy". It is a good read and it may make you look at your own life differently. I know it did that for me.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Gospel of Hope, September 12, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: The Abbey Up the Hill: A Year in the Life of a Monastic Day-Tripper (Paperback)

The cover was pretty and the author grew up in the state where I now reside, so I read it. As I opened to the first page I thought "I hope I like it. I hope I understand it."

I was engrossed from the beginning. The author has a gift for words and she frames them beautifully in a completely readable style. She is the Andee (being a woman) Rooney of spiritual journeys. She has an acerbic wit and she uses it skillfully in spinning her tale.

She seems to scream "Let me in. Don't shut me out." But the doors keep closing on her, sometimes as a result of her own actions. She begins to feel that she is somehow different from others but she cannot put her finger on it. She does not even quite fit into a traditional church. She longs to find her spiritual home and to be accepted into its life.

This sets the tone for her journey. But it is not an easy path. Doors still keep closing to her and more rejections block her way. In pain, which she shares with the reader, she continues her search for acceptance and for faith. She is persistent, but she is not always patient. She keeps expecting and not finding more from life.

In the meantime, I LOVED the stories of the desert fathers which were interwoven with her own very personal story. I found their 6th century advice sage, funny, and occasionally hilariously out of step with life as we know it today.

The author of the book spoke directly to my heart. I cried for her and I rejoiced with her. She delivers the Gospel of hope. If I can do it you can too. Hang in there.