Customer Reviews

Voices of Silence: Lives of the Trappists Today

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I highly recommend this book for several reasons. None of them have to do with giving the public a picture of what really goes on behind closed doors at a Trappist monastery. If your only interest in Trappist life is some voyeuristic urge to know the secret life of monks, I'm afraid you'll be disappointed.

The review that suggests that Bianco's book isn't an accurate picture of Trappist life doesn't make much sense to me. Bianco's assignment was to go to several Trappist monasteries and write about what he found there. His writing is crisp, and I am sure he would say he relayed the facts as he witnessed them.

There is a more important reason to read Bianco's story of his time amongst the Trappists. Bianco went to the monastery to do his job as a reporter, showing voyeurs what monks really do in that cloister. What he encountered in the monastery was an unexpected connection with his hidden brothers in Christ who prayed out their lives "known only to God." More importantly, Bianco encountered a God who loves him intensely and used his experience with the Trappists to bring him through a profound grief to a place of peace and security in his life. I suppose his journalistic detachment and objectivity slipped a bit in the telling of his story.

If Bianco had emerged from his time with the Trappists unchanged, I would have been disappointed. He tells an important story with courage and sensitivity, and we are the richer for his efforts.

If you really want to know what life in a monastery is like, go spend time in one. St. Benedict's rule still requires the reception of visitors, and all the Benedictine foundations I know have made terrific provisions for those seeking times of recollection. If you to hear what happened to Frank Bianco when he went through the cloister gates, read this book.

The author, a semi-practicing Catholic dealing with the death of his youngest son, entered into the life of the Trappist monks in several monasteries. From that experience, he gives us a mixture of monastic history, of lives of selected (composite) monks discerning their calling and growth, and a picture of the issues confronting the religious community as they grapple with the issues raised by Vatican II.

The resulting book stresses several points:

Monk are human with the same foibles as the non-vowed Catholic population.

That a major component of what sets monks apart is the stability of their lives and the community in which those lives are lived; this results in an environment where confronting oneself and one's masks is inevitable.

That balance of work, play and prayer is essential to fostering wholeness.

That the monk's life is nearly a universal human activity and that much of what formerly distinguished the professed religious life is now adopted/adapted by dedicated laity.

That God truly works in mysterious ways - exemplified by the author's changed understanding of God as he finally confronts his son's death.

The genius of the book is that it achieves the list given above primarily through the narrative of human experience within the monastic community. Where more abstract theology/history is provided, it is generally within the context of conversation with individual monks presenting their individual experience and belief.

With the narrative, there are individuals that the reader comes to care about - the crusty, rigid Br. Bede, the Texas ranch boy Mac, the novice Gabriel ... Through these and many others, the reader catches glimpses of themselves and their own needs. In this sense, the lives of the monks as presented, serve as a mirror nudging the reader to examine themselves as the monks are examining themselves.

I recommend this book to those who find themselves on a spiritual journey. Having glanced at other reviews of the text, I agree that it is less a general introduction to the Trappist way of life and more of a documentary of the author's personal exploration of their spirituality. This exploration is in the context of the loss of his son; the tragedy is actually the impetus for his spiritual quest. In that sense, I believe readers that are similarly engaged will find the book much, much more meaningful and accessable than those who may be reading out of detached academic interest.

More than anything, I think the book provides a great insight into the charism of the Trappists Mr. Bianco lived with, and for anyone considering spending some time "off grid", it sheds a lot of light on the potential experience. If you are on the journey, or perhaps more accurately, engaged in the battle, I think this book will help.

Don't read this book unless you're prepared to handle the cold, hard truth about the spiritual life and monks who make it their profession. It isn't easy and it isn't abstract, and monks will be the first to admit, that for all their honest effort, they fall on their faces just as this book reveals in fascinating detail. More than one monk took the time to praise this book "as a major contribution to the understanding of modern monasticism." Those are the words on the book's back cover, written by the Washington Post's respected columnist and critic, Coleman McCarthy, who was once himself a Trappist. Better yet, consider what Milwaukee Archbishop Rembert Weakland, O.S.B., onetime Benedictine Abbot General, wrote about the book: "Frank Bianco brings monks to life in his book and lets the human and the spiritual shine through. Most graciously he shares with the reader his own spiritual transformation that resulted from encounters with monks, men whose lives are devoted to seeking God." A Trappist Master of Novices recommended this book to me while I was living at his abbey for an extended period, trying to come to terms with my marital problems. I saw for myself how the book was right on target. The spiritual life is all about finding God as he offers himself in the day-to-day, seemingly ordinary people and events, which is what the author learned. It's not for anyone who's trying to hide from life. To his credit (and to the reader's benefit ultimately) the author submitted himself to the life just as an ordinary monk does. He wanted to learn why God brought him to the monastery seemingly by accident and why he was able to regain his faith by opening himself as monks do - to what only seems to be ordinary in everyday life. There's all too many books on the spiritual life that duck life's tough questions by labeling them as "mysterys." That wasn't good enough for the monks whose struggles are revealed in this book and who trusted the author to tell people what other writers didn't understand or never learned. This may not be the best book ever written about monastic life, but a better one has yet to published.

This is an excellent introduction into the Catholic monastic tradition. If anyone is interested in knowing more about the Cisterican type of monasticism and fundamental spiritual principles, this is the book. It reads easily and gives a good presentation of this once very mysterious type of monastic community. Referring to it time and time again, it provides glimpses into contemporary Trappist life and experiences but also provides key if not very basic, yet deep, concepts of the spiritual life. This book can be a springboard going to other reading on monastic values and the Trappist tradition. Highly recommended. I would accompany this book with a recent presentation by Michael Downey called Trappist.

VOICES OF SILENCE: THE LIVES OF TRAPPISTS TODAY could best be described as three stories melding into one. It tells the story of Trappist monks and gives a brief history of the order. It deals specifically with the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky and the people who inhabit this fascinating place. The third strain of the story is that of the author Frank Bianco, a journalist struggling with faith after a major tragedy in his life and how his personal contact with the Trappists in general and the monks of Gethsemani in particular helped him begin to cope with the enormity of loss in his life and the importance of faith.

Bianco does give us a history per se, but intersperses his observations of the monks as well as his personal feelings throughout the book. It's an easy read with short penetrating chapters. At some points it reads like a novel, particularly when he writes about the monks who had the greatest impact on his life: Brother Gabriel, the young monk who is in the process of discerning, Dom Timothy MacDonald, or Mac as he is called in the book, the lovable Brother Saul, and perhaps the monk who challenged and inspired him most, the irascible Fr. Bede.

The book is both unapologetic and reverential. We see the monks as people striving to grow closer to God who are also people with flaws and idiosyncrasies. We do not meet "cute" monks who are a caricature of religious life. Rather we meet people who live a vastly different life than most people in our modern world, yet have the ability to speak to the core of our humanity.

Perhaps the reason this book was enjoyable to me was due to the fact I recently returned from a visit to Gethsemani Abbey where many of the monks in this book live (or at least once lived). I saw the monks "up close and personal" so to speak, and had the opportunity to observe the monks in action. In many ways this book confirmed what I saw upon visiting and serves as a reminder of the powerful spiritual witness of Trappist monks in our world today.

This was a very fine book, very moving. It was sad, actually, to have finished reading the book as I thought I was putting away a good friend. The book was informative enough in teaching readers about the Trappist way of life---yet revealed the Trappists to be very real individuals. For those looking for scandal, they are in for disappointment. The humanity of these fine men is amazing. And, do not forget to read Mr. Bianco's introduction as it reveals the heart and soul of the man and what he learns about God and himself in his time with the Trappists.

Bianco carries us past monastic walls and through the shroud of mystery which surounds the lives of people who choose this life of solitude. He allows us to see Trappist monks as real people: dedicated, holy, committed, hard working, sometimes petty, but always real.

It is a credit to him as a writer and a person that he was permitted to chronicle the monk's lives from the inside - or as close to the inside as a non-monk can get. It is a credit to the monks that they were willing to share the meaning and style of monastic living.

Bianco was comfortable sharing a complete picture of Trappist life, and, although he never intended an expose, did not shy away from the human side of men living communally. His portrayal of the difficulties of this existance will help many to understand both the value and the need for that type of service.

A spiritual book in the sense that the reader will feel drawn toward a higher calling and a greater devotion to God, it is, at all times, a story of men and women - some saintly, all human.

There is nothing simple about the simple life of the Trappist, but there is also nothing of value to be gained by a life without pain. Above all, Bianco shows us that God is present in these houses and in the lives of these monks.

We were permitted inside the monastic enclosure to observe the lives of men who have dedicated their lives to prayer. Bianco and the monks have given us an intelligent and moving visit.

The result of many interviews of Trappist monks in both the United States and France, this book contains several insightful biographical sketches of modern Trappists. As we meet several monks and learn what brought them to the monastery as well as why they stay, we learn a great deal about how modern monasteries work and about the personal and emotional struggles the monks deal with.

Readers who are familiar only with the pre-Vatican II monastery depicted in Thomas Merton's "The Seven Storey Mountain" will find this book an eye-opener, as there have been a great many changes since the 1940s in how Cistercian monasteries are run and how the monks live.

The only fault of this book is the author's intermittent surrender to sentimentality as he details events in his own life and the lives of the monks that brought them to the monastery. But he ultimately resists the temptation to let these narratives overwhelm the documentary accounts of the monasteries he ! visited. In the end, readers will come away with a rich appreciation of these monks, their lifestyle, and their devotion to God.

This is certainly a wonderful book about monsatic life. The author, was obviously trusted by many to be able to enter into their lives so poingantly. Yet, this may not be the most revealing insight in this book. I found most meaningful the stories of real life...within the monastary for sure, but human stories of relationship, covenant, community, all lived out in the presence of our God...and all told from the unique perspective of a searching and grieving father.

This book certainly gives you more than a peek at monastic life...but read sacredly the review at the bottom of the cover...this book certainly was a good and Godly "kick in the assumptions."

Read and ponder.