Twelve Steps to Holiness. The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs

Many writers on the spiritual life have used the analogy of climbing a ladder, as we progress towards that degree of perfection which Our Lord demands of us, 'Be ye perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect' (Matthew 5:48). It must originate in the story of Jacob's Ladder, on which he saw the angels ascending and descending --and since humility is the key to all virtue, who is to say whether we should be trying to go up, or to go down. St Benedict is the most familiar of those writers who...