Seminar on Spirituality in Loneliness
Glen Attard - Michael Zammit 

In our post-Covid world that could not go back to being physically connected and socially visible any faster, loneliness emerges as one of the most real and devastating ‘epidemics’ of our time. Indeed, one shudders to think of the real effects of the Covid pandemic when already in January 2018 the British Conservative MP Tracey Crouch was elected Minister for Loneliness, the first ever of her kind in the entire world. Alas, in actual fact, as David Vincent points out, “Current anxieties about the ‘loneliness epidemic’ and the fate of interpersonal relations in the digital culture are reformulations of dilemmas that have surfaced in prose and verse for more than two millennia.”

One such reiteration is by the poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) who, in his eighth letter to F.X. Kappus, touches on a kind of transition or transformation that occurs within us when we befriend the fact that we are, really and truly, solitary beings. There is a dangerous insecurity, he says, in accepting this, which is so much more human than being imprisoned in all our other certainties. Only when one is lonely could one be attentive to one’s soul.

Basing ourselves on the fundamental distinction between loneliness and solitude, this seminar will take the form of a reading session during which we will be reflecting on the deep considerations that Rilke shares with the young Kappus on this theme.

Saturday 11 March 2023 
10:00 AM - 12:00 PM 
Via Zoom

Language: English

How to Register: Send an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Payment: The seminar is being organized free of charge; however, if you wish to donate, you may do so:

(1) via bank transfer to our account [IBAN] MT 28 VALL 2201 3000 0000 400 1797 9621 [beneficiary "Carmelite Institute"]

(2) by cheque addressed to "Carmelite Institute" for amounts greater than €20 (as per directive n. 19 issued by the Central Bank of Malta)