Refectory Readings

Over the past few months we have been reading before Compline Robert Cardinal Sarah’s book The Song of the Lamb: Sacred Music and the Heavenly Liturgy in conversation with Peter Carter, director of the Catholic Sacred Music Project. Published in 2025, this book covers five major topics: The nature of the Liturgy, Contemplation and Actual Participation in the Liturgy, the crisis of Liturgical culture, the path of liturgical renewal, and the way of beauty and the way of the cross.

In these pages, Cardinal Sarah offers timely reflections on the role of Latin and Gregorian chant in the liturgy. Rather than merely lamenting the almost ubiquitous disappearance of these elements in parishes, the Cardinal offers practical solutions for priests and choirmasters looking to build up a basic repertoire of […]

At the evening meal in the refectory, the monks are reading this unique biography of the servant of God, Don Dolindo Ruotolo (1882-1970), which draws the reader into the hidden holiness of a priest who lived entirely for God’s will.

A friend of Padre Pio, miracle worker, and endowed with the gift of prophecy, Don Dolindo wrote the famous Surrender prayer, often prayed as a novena.

Hardcover, 299 pages, published in Italian in 2020 and translated into English in 2026.

Jesus, I Surrender Myself to You is both a moving spiritual biography and a profound witness to the transforming power of surrender to God’s will. Drawing from the living memory of Don Dolindo Ruotolo through the testimony of his devoted niece Grazia, alongside the careful research of Luciano […]

At the evening meal in the refectory, the monks are reading Carlo Acutis: A Saint in Sneakers by Courtney Mares, recently published in 2023.

From a young age, Carlo’s enthusiasm for Jesus was contagious. His witness brought his own family back to faith. Carlo called the Eucharist “my highway to heaven” and was eager to tell everyone about the incredible reality of Christ’s true presence in the world.

How does a city boy who only lived to the age of fifteen “go viral” more than a decade after he died? Discover the story of Blessed Carlo Acutis, the first millennial to be beatified by the Catholic Church.

Born in 1991, the same year as the launch of the World Wide Web, Carlo has been hailed by the pope as an example of love and holiness […]

At the evening meal in the refectory, the monks have just finished reading A Saint in the Slave Trade: Peter Claver (1581–1684) by Arnold Lunn, originally published in 1935 and reprinted in 2021.
Reflecting on humanistic outrages from Roman times to recent years, A Saint in the Slave Trade offers philosophical and spiritual insights on how the power of Christian charity revolutionizes and liberates souls in the direst situations.

Captured and separated from all he loved, fettered down in a ship amid relentless waves and disease, Peter Claver lived at the mercy of his captors. Water and food were scarce, prisoners were tortured and tormented, and the heat and decrepitude were intolerable. Many succumbed to death, while others committed suicide or were killed.

This is the desperate situation into which St. Peter Claver (1581–1684) voluntarily […]

At the evening meal in the refectory, the monks have just finished reading The Good, the Bad, and the Beautiful: History in Three Dimensions by Joseph Pearce, published in 2023.
Inspired by Pope Benedict XVI’s vision of the history of the Church, Joseph Pearce traces three strands interwoven in Church History: The Good Saints, The Bad Persecutors, and The Beautiful Art.

Christ is “the way, and the truth, and the life”, but fallen mankind, although made in Christ’s image, is not so pure. Human history—including Church history—is a tapestry woven of three threads: the good, the bad, and the beautiful. This book tells the story of Christendom over two millennia, focusing on what was good, bad, and beautiful in […]

Blessed Charles of Austria: A Holy Emperor and His Legacy tells the story of Karl or Charles Hapsburg, the last of the Holy Roman Emperors, who died in 1922 and was beatified in 2004.
Charles Coulombe expertly traces the idea of empire and Catholic monarchy throughout the centuries, as well as the lineage of both Charles and his wife, Zita of Bourbon-Parma, whose cause for beatification Clear Creek Abbey is promoting. Charles’s deep Catholic faith and devotion to his family come to the fore in the narrative, in addition to his skill and wisdom in statecraft and generalship.

From the foreword by Archduke Karl von Hapsburg, grandson of Blessed Karl:

Thinking about Blessed Emperor Karl, three principal roles of the man present themselves: the soldier, the politician, and the family man. The most […]