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Ulterior Lives: The Outsider Politics of Monasticism

On the absence of children
On the face of it, the most long-running anarchist commune in Western history had no investment in what it was building: the end was wired in.
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
Exorcising the male gaze
The hermits sought to overcome the sexual predations of patriarchy, but they left some difficult questions behind them
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
To be in solitude, together
The hermits show us the easily missed connection between personal spiritualities and the political economies they lean toward
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
Where and how did the Hermits live?
Unpicking the surprising, and moving, practicalities of early ascetic lives.
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
Finding paradise by accident
Do the heavenly-minded find paradise on Earth intentionally, or just as some by-product of other choices?
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
The puzzle of kindly deceit
A well-meant dishonesty seems to go by uncommented by the Desert Fathers & Mothers. But then again, what would you prefer?
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
The Hermits & The Law
How a murder mystery and a miracle give us a glimpse into a life beyond the law.
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
1
Forgetting how to quarrel
A utopian tale on the death of homo economicus
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
A new economy... inside yourself
What if desert ascetics were escaping from the political realities of violent rule—in the one place they could control?
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
6
Friendship at the happy end of time
Ulterior Lives: A reminder of the necessary joy that animates all our efforts and theories of change.
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
1
Fellow Creatures & Mutual Aid
Ulterior Lives: How St Paul's hermetic life relates to creaturely life
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
Escape to an Austere Paradise
Ulterior Lives #2: On The Life of St. Paul the Hermit
 • 
The Passio Project
 and 
David Benjamin Blower
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