All the links here are to organizations or communities that I have some personal relationship with, and have been a resource and aid in my life and ministry. It reflects the limits of my personal experience and is not intended to be a comprehensive list on these subjects!

Contemplative Christianity & Monastic spirituality:

• Contemplative Outreach contemplativeoutreach.org is committed to the contemplative renewal of Christian life, through facilitating the practice of Centering Prayer.

• The Center for Action and Contemplation cacradicalgrace.org exists as a training center to integrate contemplative spirituality with compassionate service to the world.

• The Spiritual Life Institute spirituallifeinstitute.org is a community of men and women who live lives of prayer and solitude, rooted in the Carmelite tradition. They run monastic retreat centers in Colorado and Ireland, and have a special affinity for Christian wilderness spirituality.

• Lebh Shomea House of Prayer lebhshomea.org, located in the South Texas desert, is a contemplative eremitical community and retreat center for people seeking solitude, silence and prayer. Regular spiritual direction is available at Lebh Shomea.

• The Order of Saint Benedict osb.org is a 1500 year old monastic order whose members seek transformation in Christ through their discipline and way of life. The website contains links for finding a nearby monastery, and links to other contemplative orders like the Trappists and Carthusians.

• Mount Saviour msaviour.org is a small Benedictine monastery located near Elmira, NY, where I (Mark) am an Oblate. Their simple Benedictine life is centered on the Litergy of the Hours and includes the operation of a sheep farm.

• Weston Priory westonpriory.org is a small Benedictine monastery in Vermont, known for their music and active involvement in peace and justice issues.

• gratefulness.org provides resources for living in the gentle power of gratefulness, and supports the writings and works of Brother David Steindl-Rast, OSB

 

Traditional Wilderness Skills:

• Hawk Circle Wilderness Education www.hawkcircle.com is a traditional wilderness skills center, offering programs both for adults and children. I made my transition from outdoor recreationalist to traditional skills practitioner at Hawk Circle. It was a great place to learn skills then, and is even better now.

• Jack Mountain Bushcraft jackmountainbushcraft.com is a bushcraft and survival skills school run by Tim Smith in Maine. Lots of good information on this site!

• The Forager’s Harvest foragersharvest.com is a wild foods website maintained by Sam Thayer, one of the best foragers around.

• Karamat Wilderness Ways www.karamat.com offers access to the writings of Mors Kochanski, one of the great elders of bush living skills.

• Earthlore Wilderness Camps earthlorewilderness.com, run by my friend Pierre Blin, is a traditional skills and lifeways program for youth in the Ottawa, Ontario area.

• Earthwalk Vermont earthwalkvermont.org offers caring, nature and earth skills-based community education in central Vermont.

• Northern Woodlands Mag northernwoodlands.org is a periodical about the forests and culture of land stewardship in Northern New England and New York. The best magazine I know of about this region.

• Wilderness Way Magazine wwmag.net is a popular (non-academic) magazine with useful how-to articles on various primitive skills topics.

• The Society of Primitive Technology is an organization dedicated to the research, practice and teaching of primitive technology. Their Bulletin offers a more scholarly/academic approach to the field.