Brother John. August Turak

six people from the Templeton Foundation. They seemed to be trying to tell me—all at once, as

      I recall—that Brother John had won the $100,000 grand prize! Initially, I suspected that friends were

      playing a practical joke, but as the call devolved into a seemingly endless loop of me screaming “No!”

      as they shouted “Yes!” I was finally convinced that Brother John had won.

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      A few weeks later, the award ceremony was held at New York City’s fabled Four Seasons Restaurant. The

      keynote speech (as well as my $100,000 check!) was delivered by one of the contest’s judges: Rick Warren,

      the best-selling author of The Purpose Driven Life. The wonderful people from the Templeton Foundation

      offered to fly Brother John to New York for the ceremony, and Father Francis, Mepkin Abbey’s abbot,

      in a highly unusual dispensation, graciously allowed him to attend. Brother John’s gentle demeanor

      and Irish sense of humor promptly stole the show. But perhaps best of all, my father, whose health was

      already rapidly failing, was able to attend, as well.

      The Templeton Prize dramatically changed my life. Brother John was published in two anthologies, The Best

      Christian Writing and The Best Catholic Writing, and this, in turn, launched me on a second career. I became a

      leadership contributor for Forbes.com, an on-air radio contributor for the BBC, and Columbia Business

      School published my book, Business Secrets of the Trappist Monks. But the common fourteen-year-old thread