Do take some time to look around the site more generally. It is a hugely useful and significant resource.

What I Do in My Spare Time.

“they do him wrong who take God just in one particular way. They take the way rather than God”.

It is from Sermon 19. Eckhart is a Dominican who lived from around 1260 to 1328. His history is controversial, but his writings are profound.

The Orthodox podcast I recommended is Our Life in Christ. If you go to their archives page and look for Feb 2005 you’ll find a four part series on Prayers to the Saints. The rest of their output is well worth listening to.

Daily Prayers (services for Morning, Evening and Night Prayer) can be found at the Church of England website.

I was asked for some book recommendations on church history. There are very few one volume histories (2,000 years is a lot to fit into a few pages) but I would recommend:

• Mark Noll, Turning Points: Decisive Moments in the History of Christianity
• John McManners (ed), The Oxford History of Christianity

If you want to look in more detail at a particular period, there is an absolutely superb annotated Bibliography here.

For more online on Benedictine monasticism see the Order of Saint Benedict. For Franciscans in this country go here and look also at the Dominicans.

For plenty of historic texts go to the Christian Classics Ethereal Library. You’ll find St. Teresa of Avila here. A good discussion of her life and work is by Rowan Williams called, unsurprisingly, Teresa of Avila.

A good site for early texts is Early Christian Writings.

Finally, I have posted some book recommendations elsewhere for the third years which might also be of interest to you.

On contemplative prayer, I would recommend:
- Martin Laird, Into the Silent Land
- Thomas Merton, Ascent to Truth

On Orthodoxy:
- Kallistos Ware, The Orthodox Way
- Hilarion Alfayev, The Mystery of Faith: An Introduction to the Teaching and Spirituality of the Orthodox Church
- Dumitru Staniloae, Orthodox Spirituality: A Practical Guide for the Faithful and a Definitive Manual for the Scholar
- Kyriacos Markides, The Mountain of Silence: A Search for Orthodox Spirituality

On Monasticism:
- Michael Casey, Strangers to the City: Reflections on the Beliefs and Values of the Rule of Saint Benedict
- Joan Chittister, Wisdom Distilled from the Daily: Living the Rule of St Benedict Today
- Rowan Williams, Silence and Honey Cakes: The Wisdom of the Desert
- Benedicta Ward: The Desert Fathers: Sayings of the Early Christian Monks (Penguin Classics)

On Mysticism:
- Frederick Bauerschmidt, Why the Mystics Matter Now
- Bernard McGinn & Patricia Ferris McGinn, Early Christian Mystics: The Divine Vision of the Spiritual Masters

Classic Texts:
- John Climacus, Ladder of Divine Ascent (Classics of Western Spirituality)
- The Pilgrim’s Tale (Classics of Western Spirituality)
- The Rule of St Benedict
- E. Kadloubovsky & G.E.H. Palmer, Writings from the “Philokalia” on Prayer of the Heart

The man divinized by grace will be everything that God is, apart from identity of essence. Maximus the Confessor Ad Thalassium 22, PG 90:320a

There are some quotes from the early Christian writers here. It’s worth scrolling down and having a read of the discussion in the comments.

• Relics, Essence and Energies
• GOD: Essence and Energies

There are some articles worth reading:

• Dr. David Bradshaw on the Concept of Divine Energies
• Gregory Palamas: Knowledge, Prayer and Vision by M C Steenberg
• Selection from the Chapters on Knowledge by St Maximos the Confessor
• On the Uncreated Essence and Uncreated Energies by St. Gregory Palamas