the guardian

In the Cloud of Unkonwing,one of the greatest works of Christian mysticism, the art of
contemplation is especially prized as a route to wisdom.For hundreds of years, this anonymous
medieval text inspired those seeking a more perfect relationship with God by transcending the
concerns of the everyday. In his own copy of the book, the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge
underscored the lines:“Active life is troubled and travailed about many things; but contemplative
sitteth in peace with one thing.”
For those attending the Labour party conference this week, there is unlikely to be much space for
meditative solitude of this kind. But for the next month or so, options are newly available for
those looking to decompress and clear out the clutter in their mind. In an experimental, counter-
cultural move that deserves to succeed, English Heritage is trialling a daily “hour of
contemplation” at 16 monastic sites in England, including Lindisfarne Priory on Holy Island and
Battle Abbey in Hastings. Between now and late October,it is intended that silence will descned on
the ruined cloisters, dormitories and transepts during the last hour of opening.Mobile phones
should be placed in pockets; concerns about the level of traffic on the way home put to one side,
and the troubles of tomorrow left to tomorrow to sort out.If the project is a success, it will
perhaps become a permanent feature at some of the country’s most beautiful and evocative religious
sites.
The booming secular interest in various forms of meditaion suggests that the “contemplaton hour”
may well cath on. Deriving originally from Buddhist practice, “mindfulness” has these days become
an industry, spawning apps,online training programmes and other forms of “wellness intervention”.
But the author of The cloud of unknowing would recognise the original spiritual principle at work:
stepping out of the quotidian flow allows a different, deeper attention to be paid to the experience
of life itself. the cloistered existence has also become an object of fascination in its own right,
with an series of documentaries chronicling the exacting demands of modern monastic life.The daily
grind of a largely secular and materialist age - and a digital revolution which has made it far
harder to switch off from the world - seems to have conferred a certain cachet on silence, spirituality
and solitude.