Ora et Labora in Our Common Home

Lucas Briola is an associate professor of theology and Endowed Chair in Catholic Thought and Culture at Saint Vincent College (Latrobe, PA). There, he also serves as the Director of the Saint Vincent Center for Catholic Thought and Culture. He is the author of The Eucharistic Vision of Laudato Si’: Praise, Conversion, and Integral Ecology (The Catholic University of America Press, 2023), along with numerous academic and popular articles.

“With his landmark volume Ora et Labora in Our Common Home, Lucas Briola offers a compelling retrieval of the Benedictine tradition as a vital yet often overlooked resource for integral ecology. Through a close reading of the Rule of St. Benedict in dialogue with an impressive array of theological voices, he brings its wisdom to bear on the challenges of modern living, revealing a mode of existence in which prayer, work, and community are integrated in a way that orders the human person toward harmony with the broader created order. Significantly, the endeavor is grounded at every turn in serious theology yet moves beyond theory to recover habits and disciplines that make ecological conversion possible. A rich and constructive contribution to contemporary Catholic thought, it will be essential reading for all who desire to embrace the Church’s vision of care for creation.”Matthew J. Ramage, PhD, professor of theology at Benedictine College and author of Cosmic Covenant: A Catholic Theology of Creation and Communion

• ContentsAcknowledgments   ixIntroduction An Integral Benedictine Ecology?   1SEEChapter 1   Listening: Hearing the Cries of the Earth and the Poor   29Chapter 2   Stability: Recovering a Sense of  (Common) Home   54JUDGEChapter 3   Humility: Overcoming Tyrannical Anthropocentrism   81Chapter 4   Hospitality: Overcoming the Technocratic Paradigm   103ACTChapter 5   Fruit of the Earth: Eating for Integral-Ecological Communion   131Chapter 6   Work of Human Hands: Working for Integral-Ecological Communion   157Chapter 7  The Opus Dei: Laudato Si’!   180ConclusionTo Prefer Nothing to Christ: The Peace of Our Common Home   207Selected Bibliography on Benedictines and Ecology   216