Part I. The way in :
To give and not to count the cost
Health and healing
The Bible today : reading & hearing
Part II. Shaping holy lives :
God's workshop
Urban spirituality
Forbidden fruit : sexuality and spirituality in perspective
Part III. Prayer and Contemplation :
Contemplation and mission
Icons and the practice of prayer
Part IV. The Genius of Teresa of Avila :
What St Teresa means to me
Teresa and the scriptures
Teresa and the eucharist
Part V. Ways of Knowing :
Julian of Norwich's way
'Know thyself : What kind of an injunction?

Apart from being a scholar and theologian, Rowan Williams has also demonstrated a rare gift for speaking and writing plainly and clearly about essentials of the Christian faith. In the chapters of this book he writes with profound perception about the life of holiness to which we are called. The range of Williams' frame of reference is astonishing - he brings poets and theologians to his aid, he writes about the Rule of St Benedict, the Bible, Icons, contemplation, St Teresa of Avila and even R.D. Laing. He concludes with two chapters on the injunction 'Know Thyself' in a Christian context. Throughout, Williams points out that holiness is a state of being - it is he writes 'completely undemonstrative and lacking any system of expertise. It can never be dissected and analysed.'