How to Be: A Monk and a Journalist Reflect on Living & Dying, Purpose & Prayer, Forgiveness & Friendship

Written by Judith Valente, Paul Quenon, OCSO and Kathleen Norris

Narrated by Pam Ward

The spiritual seeker’s guide to living with authenticity and integrity in troubled times.



This book is a dialogue between two spiritual seekers—one a Trappist monk and the other a married professional woman. It is two people "stuttering to articulate life's universal questions from diverse contexts and perspectives." Brother Paul writes as one steeped in silence and the daily rhythms of the ancient prayer practices of monasticism. Judith Valente writes as a professional woman attempting to bring a sense of prayer and contemplation to a scattered life in the secular world.



Valente uses the story of Brother Paul's interview for a PBS documentary as a jumping-off point: When asked the purpose of the Trappist life in the modern world, he said that it is "to show you don't need a purpose." The purpose of life, he said, is life. "You're to live your life."



How to Be offers a window into two people living their lives on purpose (or not) and struggling to come to terms with the big issues everyone faces: faith, mortality, mystery, prayer, and work. It is a book that provides insight and inspiration for those walking the spiritual path—particularly for those interested in the contemplative path.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Nov 9, 2021
• ISBN: 9781666152388

Judith Valente

Judith Valente covers the religion beat for PBS-TV's national program Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly. Her reports have also appeared on The News Hour on PBS and on Chicago Public Radio and National Public Radio. She has worked as a news producer for WTTW/Chicago and is a former staff writer of The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal, where in 1992, she was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in in the feature writing category. She has won nine broadcast awards and was twice nominated for an Emmy. Valente is a speaker, retreat leader, and the author of two collections of poetry. In 2004, she won the Aldrich Poetry Prize, which was judged by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mary Oliver. She is co-editor of the anthology Twenty Poems to Nourish Your Soul. She has been a frequent guest on WTTW's weekly program 30 Good Minutes to talk about monastic wisdom for the modern world. She recently became a Benedictine Oblate. Valente and her husband Judge Charles Reynard live in Chicago and Normal, IL.