Welcome to The Virtual Hermitary!
promoting grace and simplicity in the Christian life
Scenes from Red Earth Hermitage
Hi! I’m Amy Jo Garner and I encourage you to take some time to explore the site, read the essays, listen to the sermons, or contemplate the devotions. My desire is to offer encouragement and stimulate thoughtful conversation on what it means to be a Christian in the 21st Century. In addition, my goal is to help Christians deepen their faith and live out their call to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. Visit the Ministry Services page to see how I can help individuals and groups.
Why a Virtual Hermitary?
The video slideshow to the right is made up of pictures taken around my home, which I have lovingly named Red Earth Hermitage. It’s a little house in an urban environment that I’ve turned into a personal spiritual retreat. I like solitude and simplicity and I try to create that atmosphere even in the middle of the city.
Consider these definitions from Dictionary.com:
Hermit: a person who has withdrawn to a solitary place for a life of religious seclusion
Hermitary: a cell annexed to an abbey, for the use of a hermit
Hermitage: the habitation of a hermit
Becoming a religious hermit is not a common vocation in the modern world.
Not many people dream of living a secluded life with little interaction with the rest of the world. Yet, a few hundred years ago, some men and women chose to spend their lives contemplating God and occasionally advising others on their spiritual journeys. A hermitary in those days was often a completely enclosed chamber attached to a church building. The hermit was literally bricked in, never to leave until he or she died. A hermitage, unlike the hermitary, was a hut or cave or some other rudimentary structure in which the hermit lived. I think of the desert fathers and mothers in the 3rd century or Thomas Merton in the 20th century.
This Web site is my and, I hope, your virtual hermitary. We may not be bricked into a room on the side of a church or monastery, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t forever attached to God. I’m a kind of modern-day hermit: I appreciate solitude and simplicity. Perhaps you do, too. I’m carving out this space on the Web as a kind of cyber-cell attached to the eternal Creator. It’s a place where we can share our contemplations and minister to one another on our shared spiritual journeys.
