Introducing 'Ulterior Lives'

Digging into the history and the social politics of monasticism, with the Passio Project.

#1: Introducing our new series, Ulterior Lives: A Slow Research Project into The Outsider Politics of Monasticism.

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Welcome to the small beginning of a new endeavour.

Ulterior Lives is a slow research project. On one hand, this is an exploration of the many and varied histories of Christian monasticism and rules of life. On the other hand, this project is interested in the social, political and economic reasons for forming alternative communities and ulterior patterns of life, across all religions and none.

Our present moment is one that recurs every so often in history. The stories at the centre of public life are fraught and contested. Food, fuel and housing are becoming more precarious for more people. There seem to be clocks ticking and debts mounting over the powerful systems that manage life and resources. Money is reliably volatile. Political systems lurch to greater extremes. There is anxiety in the order of things.

At a certain point, the desire for different patterns begins to feel urgent. The puzzle haunts common discourse like a Rubik's cube, locked by enchantment. Everyone takes turns trying and failing to solve it. I find myself often mingling through dubious crowds at the wall, trying to work out how to exit. What does one need to do differently in order to escape the chaotic monopoly? What must be relinquished from the present in order to go through the gate and live otherwise, to the side of a failing situation?

Presently, there is some curiosity about that seemingly archaic ideal: the religious order, living in community by a strict Rule of Life. It’s possible that the ideal might be more interesting to today's sensibilities than the practice itself, but the interest is real and comes from varying directions: from Shane Claibourne's progressive New Monasticism, to Rod Dreher’s conservative call for a Benedictine Option. From Jordan Peterson’s pseudo-secularised Rules for Life, to Giorgio Agamben's anarchist reading of the Franciscans.

Whether progressive or conservative, whether religious or not religious, there is much feeling around for a Rule of Life these days. There is some intuition in the air; a sense that something like this might give form to a dangerously liminal and un-contained time; or that some image of monastic life might help to parry or sidestep the violent blows landing at the centre of public life; or that there is something here that might give good ground for a common life seeking to exist on radically different terms.

I'm not an impartial commentator, and I don't empathise with all hopes and positions. I have a suspicion that a great deal of monasticism might confound or subvert the uses people would like to put it to. I'm certainly not looking for a collective answer to a perceived collective question. But I am looking for modes of change, and signs of goodly otherness. In a situation where Western consumption self-destructively despoils, and where reliance on centralised systems sends my best intentions back to the treadmill every time, there is something compelling about a history of movements that have lived sustainably on very little, some of them renouncing private property altogether. Most movements attempting to achieve this sort of thing are brief and disastrous. Though histories of monasticism have plenty of their own disasters, there are too many examples of communities living simply, sustainably and contentedly to not be a little curious.

To be sure, this research project is not looking for a solution to a problem, but for what can be learned from those ulterior communities, when many of us feel stuck under the monopoly of a failing image of life.

What might this look like?

By way of sketching this project I should introduce myself. I am a political theologian and an artist. I’m not a scholar of monasticism or church history, so this is an ongoing learning journey for me. I am personally motivated by all the questions above. I'll be posting brief episodic pieces every few weeks, with occasional dialogues and guest writers coming in to open the windows.

The lens will be cast in social, political and economic questions. It is hoped that whatever is uncovered will be of interest to anyone exploring how communities can live differently, whether religious or not. Indeed this project aims to explore the common ground between religious orders and radical communities of other kinds: socialist communes, arts collectives, cooperatives, mutual aid networks, revolutionary movements, religious cults, weird orders with secret handshakes: the good and the bad and the shocking: this project aims to learn from ulterior lives of various sorts.

It's called a slow research project because it’s open ended and seeks to uncover the treasures by showing up, simply, over a period of time: the slow development of a thick description. It's called a slow research project just because I'll be gathering things I don't know much about. I certainly don't expect to find anything that others don’t know about. I'll simply be archiving small stories and reflections through the lens of some rather particular questions.

Over time I hope this project will become collaborative, shaped by the thoughts, responses, curiosities and steers of readers. I want to hear from you about where I should go looking, and which questions weigh heavily.

The project will be hosted on the Passio Substack page, where it’ll be interspersed with our other Passio posts from the Magazine and beyond. If you'd like to follow the journey, please feel free to subscribe and get in touch with whatever thoughts you may have along the way.

As with everything we do in the Passio Project, this slow research project is supported by the Passionists, a Catholic religious order committed to works of solidarity with suffering people and the suffering creation, founded in 1720. You can read our previous series exploring Passionist writings here, or find out more about the modern-day order on their website.