Ora et Labora in Our Common Home

Discover how a Benedictine way of life can inform and inspire our care for creation.

What is the relevance of the Benedictine tradition for an integral ecology? In Ora et Labora in Our Common Home, Lucas Briola unearths the deep roots of the Benedictine tradition and explores how the Benedictine way of life can inform and inspire our care for creation. Through a close reading of the Rule of Benedict, Briola examines seven practices and habits characteristic of that life that sustain an integral ecology: listening, stability, humility, hospitality, eating, working, and praise.

Ora et Labora in Our Common Home situates the 1,500-year-old heritage of Benedictine monasticism in dialogue with our ecological plight, showing the perennial wisdom of this venerable tradition. In so doing, the book offers a Benedictine vision of integral-ecological conversion that ranges from the smallest details of life with other creatures to the universal chorus of praise that draws all creation together to life with God. Ultimately, it captures how concern for our common home is inseparable from Saint Benedict’s call to “prefer nothing whatever to Christ” (RB 72.11).

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.