At this time of post-millennial ferment, it is perhaps legitimate to ask whether contemplatives retain any relevance in our increasingly secular society. Simone Weil thought that a different kind of contemplation is needed today: “…a fresh spring, an invention…almost equivalent to a new revelation of the universe and human destiny.” She insisted on “the miraculous newness “ required of today’s contemplative.

However remote these quiet mystics may seem to us, the modern world needs contemplatives precisely because they refresh and renew the tired old dogmas into which all religions and worldviews lapse over time. Forms of words in ancient liturgies take on a nostalgic potency like some old song, which can obscure the need for mystical, contemplative experience.

Young people in particular are turning away from traditional worship because it seems to offer them no escape from the tyranny of a wholly man-made world. By contrast, the contemplative is the nearest we have to a human bridge between that part of us which creates the fragile infrastructure of our lives, and the higher self which, according to the mystics, lives close to the divine.

Throughout history, the greatest of the contemplatives have been at odds with the Church and other authorities. St John of the Cross was imprisoned because of his support for St Teresa of Avila and her reformed Carmelite order. St Teresa herself, was in constant hot water for her simple-hearted espousal of the poverty of St Francis. The order she created was known as the Bare-footed Carmelites and was deemed by authority to be a step too far, whether shod or not. Both were subsequently canonized, posthumously, of course, and John was made a Doctor of the Church. During their lifetimes, they would undoubtedly have been acutely embarrassed by such august recognition.

In the frantic, modern world we need contemplatives more than ever, even if most of us are not aware of their existence.