Against the dominant voices of power, wealth, and privilege, Jesus valorized and lifted up the lowly, marginal, and oppressed in both his life and his teachings, notably the Beatitudes. The reflections on the Beatitudes, which invite you to hear afresh Jesus’ countercultural message in our own day, were developed in collaboration with the Communities for Spiritual Vitality for Lent 2026.

During Advent and Christmastide 2025, as we await and welcome the coming of our Savior, we invite you to join us in praying with a series of new seasonal Collects. These seven prayers, newly authored by the Brothers, draw on the richness of both scriptural language and imagery and the Christian tradition. Accompanying the prayer book Collects for the seasons, these new prayers form a part of our community’s intentional experiment with inclusive and expansive language in our liturgies this coming year.

Each day, we Brothers gather beneath the gaze of sixteen of our forebears in the religious life, spanning from Anthony of Egypt in the third century to our own founder, Richard Meux Benson, in the nineteenth. As the sun illuminates their faces in our clerestory windows, creating icons in glass, so did their own faces—and lives—shine with the light of new life in Christ through his death and resurrection. “In your light,” we pray with the psalmist, “we see light” (Ps 36:9).

In a series of sixteen video reflections on our monastic ancestors, we invite you to reflect on your own “family tree of faith.” Whose face shines out God’s light and love into your heart? Whose example inspires you to make your own life “shine like stars in the world” (Phil. 2:15)?

IN THE MIDST meets us where we are: in this world marked by death, fear, despair, violence, and suffering. Can it be true that God is here, in our experience of chaos and grief? Join the Brothers of SSJE in this five-week exploration of the invitation that waits in even the hardest, messiest parts of life.

This five-week series will be released for Lent 2024, but can be used any time. Five meditations to read, listen to, or watch. Five weeks of reflection prompts, questions, and practices. For individuals or groups. We hope you will join us IN THE MIDST.

Materials and resources for this learning series as we’ll get out of our often too-serious and word-filled heads, move, create and see, imagine, and linger with God.

Go through the lessons at your own pace.

Video Series now

Many of us spend time and energy seeking the “glittering” things we think will make us happy, only to find that deep joy and peace and love have eluded us. Br. David Vryhof invites us to discover the “freedom of the children of God” (Romans 8:21) that comes when we ground our identity in God, rather than in those things that the world counts most valuable.

Join Br. James Koester anytime for an online multi-media presentation on praying with the Icon of the Nativity.

The first three videos offer a welcoming introduction on how to pray with icons.

Then explore five meditations on different parts of the icon, which can be watched in your own time. You might schedule a quiet retreat day to watch all five meditations together, or watch them over a period of several days.

Video Series

Making decisions is a part of life. Join Br. David Vryhof in exploring the role of prayer in making life choices. How do we discern which of the options before us represents “the will of God” for our lives?

Audio Series

Listen to this audio series from Br. Curtis Almquist which follows Saint Paul’s names for “the fruit of the Spirit”: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, humility, and self-control. Optionally, there is an online space to reflect with others listeners.

The Twelve Days of Christmas follow from December 25 until January 6, the Feast of the Epiphany, the traditional date when the Magi arrived to present gifts to infant Jesus. For many, the meaning of these days is lost. By Christmas night we are saturated with the holiday hype, overfed by music and food, and may already be disappointed that the presents received are not enough.

This audio book is not a bah humbug about Christmas customs and presents. This is simply an invitation to go deeper than the tinsel and wrappings, beyond the presents given and received, to the source of all the good gifts in life. Readers are invited to unwrap gifts that will last, praying the twelve days of Christmas.

Have you ever wished to deepen your relationship with God? To experience a warm friendship with God? Maybe even fall in love with God – again – or for the very first time?

This PDF workbook of a six-week journey of reflection on time is now available as an anytime series for individuals and groups.

Relationship with God, Self, Creation & Others

God, the Chief Gardener of our souls, invites us to grow into fullness of life. Just as stakes and lattices nurture the growth of young plants, so too can spiritual disciplines support the flourishing of our whole being. Explore a tool from monastic spirituality called a ‘Rule of Life’ to cultivate your relationships with God, Self, Others, and Creation.

Stop, Pray, Work, Play & Love

So much of our stress and anxiety derives from our pollution of Time. God has given us the gift of time, and called it holy, yet we often experience time as a curse. Recapture time as a gift and discover how to experience the joy of the present moment.