Brother David Steindl-Rast was voted by the members and visitors of Universe Spirit as our October Spiritual Teacher/Artist of the month.
Brother David Steindl-Rast was born July 12, 1926, in Vienna, Austria, where he studied art, anthropology, and psychology, receiving an MA from the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts and a PhD from the University of Vienna. In 1952 he followed his family who had emigrated to the United States. In 1953 he joined a newly founded Benedictine community in Elmira, NY, Mount Saviour Monastery, of which he is now a senior member. In 1958/59 Brother David was a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Cornell University, where he also became the first Roman Catholic to hold the Thorpe Lectureship, following Bishop J.D.R. Robinson and Paul Tillich.
After twelve years of monastic training and studies in philosophy and theology, Brother David was sent by his abbot to participate in Buddhist-Christian dialogue, for which he received Vatican approval in 1967. His Zen teachers were Hakuun Yasutani Roshi, Soen Nakagawa Roshi, Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, and Eido Shimano Roshi. He co-founded the Center for Spiritual Studies in 1968 and received the 1975 Martin Buber Award for his achievements in building bridges between religious traditions.
Together with Thomas Merton, Brother David helped launch a renewal of religious life. From 1970 on, he became a leading figure in the House of Prayer movement, which affected some 200,000 members of religious orders in the United States and Canada.
For decades, Brother David divided his time between periods of hermit's life and extensive lecture tours on five continents. On a two-month lecture tour in Australia, for example, he gave 140 lectures and traveled 12,000 miles within Australia without backtracking. His wide spectrum of audiences has included starving students in Zaire and faculty at Harvard and Columbia Universities, Buddhist monks and Sufi retreatants, Papago Indians and German intellectuals, New Age communes and Naval Cadets at Annapolis, missionaries on Polynesian islands and gatherings at the United Nations, Green Berets and participants at international peace conferences. Brother David has brought spiritual depth into the lives of countless people whom he touches through his lectures, his workshops, and his writings.
He has contributed to a wide range of books and periodicals from the Encyclopedia Americana and The New Catholic Encyclopedia, to the New Age Journal and Parabola Magazine. His books have been translated into many languages. Gratefulness, The Heart of Prayer: An Approach to Life in Fullness, and Listening Heart : The Spirituality of Sacred Sensuousness have been reprinted and anthologized for more than two decades. Brother David co-authored Belonging to the Universe: Explorations on the Frontiers of Science and Spirituality (winner of the 1992 American Book Award), a dialogue on new paradigm thinking in science and theology with physicist, Fritjof Capra. His dialogue with Buddhists produced The Ground We Share : Everyday Practice, Buddhist and Christian, co-authored with Robert Aitken Roshi. His most recent books are Music of Silence 2 Ed: A Sacred Journey through the Hours of the Day , co-written with Sharon Lebell, and Words of Common Sense for Mind, Body, and Soul.
Brother David contributed chapters or interviews to well over 30 books. An article by Brother David was included in The Best Spiritual Writing, 1998. His many audio and videotapes are widely distributed.
At present, Brother David serves a worldwide Network for Grateful Living, through www.gratefulness.org, an interactive website with several thousand participants daily from more than 235 countries.
Books and audio by Brother David Steindl-Rast:
- Gratefulness, The Heart of Prayer: An Approach to Life in Fullness
- Listening Heart : The Spirituality of Sacred Sensuousness
- Music of Silence 2 Ed: A Sacred Journey through the Hours of the Day
- Words of Common Sense for Mind, Body, and Soul
- Belonging to the Universe: Explorations on the Frontiers of Science and Spirituality
- Jesus and Lao Tzu: The Parallel Sayings
- The Ground We Share : Everyday Practice, Buddhist and Christian
- Grateful Heart (Audio Cassette)
- Three Ways of the Spiritual Path (Audio Cassette)
- Living in the Now (Audio Cassette)
- The Body : Sensuousness and Spirituality (Audio Cassette)
- Addiction and Spiritual Quest (Audio Cassette)
- Body/Spirit (Audio Cassette)
- Enjoying Poetry (Audio Cassette)
- Overview of the Christian Myths (2 tapes) (Audio Cassette)
- Healing Starts from the Heart (2 tapes) (Audio Cassette)
- Mysticism as a Frontier Experience (Audio Cassette)
Please visit www.gratefulness.org for more information on Brother David’s life and work.
Click here to see the complete list of Teachers of Universal Spirituality Recognized by Universe Spirit.