Crossing: Reclaiming the Landscape of Our Lives - Mark Barrett OSB speaks at St Paul's Forum

Crossing has been described as a modern spiritual classic. In it, Mark Barrett, a Benedictine monk at Worth Abbey, opens up the life of a 21st century monk in the hope that 'the reader would find that we monastics -- so often the shadowy medieval figures of media-gothic -- are in reality fellow-seekers, apprentices training among the tools of a spiritual workshop'. He explores the spiritual journey made each day in the cycle of the ancient monastic offices, from Vigils before dawn, when he hopes 'to want to want to pray', to the night office of Compline, 'a time for remembering the reality of death, lest we forget to live in the first place'. More than ten years on from its first publication -- years that were punctuated by unexpected fame for the monks of Worth Abbey through the television series The Monastery -- he will reflect on the response to the book, the series, and the continuing search for prayer inside and outside the monastery.