Mathew Joseph

The Aspirant Mathew Joseph

If you do not become what you once aspired to become, does it matter?

'The Aspirant' looks for an answer to this perennial question. It is the story of a young man who once wanted to become a Carmelite monk, but ended up becoming a monk of a different order - a civil servant. The disillusionment with the way monastic life was practiced, made him take this new direction.

The journey ahead as a bureaucrat in CAG's institution took the author to many places across the globe and caused him to meet several people - ordinary people with extraordinary stories - and those stories add extra layers to this memoir. And all through his life's varied voyages, a part of him remained as a monk.

'The Aspirant' attempts to demystify two venerable institutions - the church and the bureaucracy - with a tinge of irreverence but without an iota of malice.