Thank you, Michael, for contributing your thoughts to this thread. I agree with you, "Holy Life" and "Spiritual Life" as they are understood today certainly care necessary nuances in western thought in the last 120 or so years that pertain to our focus here. And, even though "Mendicant Life" is surely a more accurate translation of the Pali term in the Pali Canon "samana;" nonetheless my preference for "Contemplative Life" stands, because, even as you point out, 'contemplative' tends to carry an unnecessary burden of thinking and not necessarily meditating; however, in John of the Cross's use of that term it was actually the cultivation of the ecstacies. So, we are caught in a linguistic and legalistic maze as we negotiate language and copyright. So, I still favor 'contemplative' over 'mendicant' because inspiring people to walk away from their material lives in this materialistic culture is going to be a hard sell, especially when my life demonstrates that so much progress can be made by someone living in this culture and maintaining a job or career, while following the Noble Eightfold Path to fruition.
