Publisher's Synopsis
The year 2009 marked the convergence of a number of anniversaries involving the missionary activity of monastic men and women: the centenary of the death of Abbot Franz Pfanner, founder of Mariannhill (1909), the centenary of the Asian Mission of the Benedictines of St. Ottilien (1909), the centenary of the Tutzing Mission to Brazil (1909), the bicentenary of the birth of Boniface Wimmer (1809), and the millennium of the martyrdom of St Bruno of Querfurt (promoter of the "evangelium paganorum" as an essential monastic value) and his Camaldolese companions as missionaries in East Prussia and Poland (1009). These anniversaries offered the occasion for extended historical and theological reflection on the relationship between monasticism and mission. Although in the popular mind the notions of "mission" and "monasticism" may seem to represent divergent concepts-the outward-bound energy of the church on the one hand, and its contemplative core on the other-a closer look at the historical realities, ancient, medieval, and modern, does not support this dichotomy.
