The Inner Search

Sometimes real breakthroughs in your spiritual life only come about after searing self-examination. Even in the 1950s, when books on Catholic prayer and spirituality could become bestsellers, the works of Dom Hubert van Zeller were exceptionally popular. A Carthusian monk (and good friend of Msgr. Ronald Knox), van Zeller had the rare gift of translating monastic spiritual wisdom developed over centuries into clear, practical advice for ordinary Catholics seeking to deepen their own prayer lives. The Inner Search, one of his most enduring and readable books, takes as its point of the departure the Psalmist's exhortation to "Seek the face of the Lord always!" Indeed, writes van Zeller, "the whole of our effort of faith, exercised throughout life, amounts precisely to this" -- and when it is pursued properly and consistently, countless benefits, spiritual and otherwise, soon follow.