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Luke Anderson, O.Cist. (1927-2025)

9/1/2025

Fr. Luke was the last monk of St. Mary's Monastery in New Ringgold, Pennsylvania (Diocese of Allentown). Google reviews claim that the "beautiful old monastery" has long been up for sale: "It has 17 bedrooms and a beautiful chapel on 12 1/2 acres." Fr. Luke was Prior and co-founder of St. Mary's, where four formerly Trappist monks had started anew around 1975. They had had differences of opinion about observance and liturgy at St. Joseph's Abbey in Spencer, Massachusetts. Anderson had made his solemn profession in Spencer in 1953 and was ordained to the priesthood the year thereafter.
The community at St. Mary's transferred to the Common Observance and attained the status of a priory of the Cistercian Order. They earned their livelihood first by making computer punch cards (long before the PC!). Later, they became tailors, making pants. Over the years, more than a dozen novices had entered St. Mary's, but none stayed.
Fr. Luke passed away on 4 January 2025 at the age of 97, the last of the four founding confreres. Alfred Schlert, Bishop of Allentown, officiated at the requiem.
Anderson wrote a thesis at the Angelicum titled The concept of truth in the philosophy of William James (1965). He also had a master's degree from Princeton University. He served on the editorial board of the Cistercian Fathers Series from ca. 1970 and was also an editor of what was supposed to be the English translation of Bernard's collected works (a joint initiative of Cistercian Publications and Consortium Press in the early 1970s). He contributed "The Rhetorical Epistemology in Saint Bernard's Super Cantica" to the acclaimed collection titled Bernardus Magister in 1992. In 2005, he published The Image and Likeness of God in Bernard of Clairvaux's Free Choice and Grace, which he dedicated to St. Teresa of Calcutta, with whom he had worked on several occasions, holding workshops and giving retreats for the Missionaries of Charity. His retreats and conferences were especially popular; he was a regular retreat master at numerous monasteries and held countless university lectures.

Monastics selling luxury products

26/12/2024

Anyone visiting a contemplative monastery in the last decades knows that they usually sell products that are in some way sweet or pious, or both. There is usually a selection of alcohol as well. Selling such goods is a way of raising funds, and even if the monastery does not have a proper gift shop (most do), there will certainly be something on sale at the porter's gate, even if it is as modest as a home-made rosary.
This approach to raising fund is a modern phenomenon, that's for sure, but just how modern is it and how has it been received? Christians convinced of the value of abstinence have long voiced criticism of the alcohol sales. Anti-monastic polemicists love to focus on this topic (Klueting 1990).
But how about the aesthetics, or let's just say advertising, of presenting monastic goods to a wide audience? Some monastics (see my honey post from Dec. 10, below) are clearly gifted and take this work seriously. In the following pictures, all taken from around 1910, we can see the modest beginnings of such visual work.

This one, above, is interesting because it shows a drawing of a Trappist monk with a sun hat at his feet. Notice that this Viennese newspaper ad includes "Palestinian Wine" and Cognac.

This Trappist liqueur is, interestingly, marketed in the feminine form: Trappistin. I don't think it was produced by Trappistines. The drink is somehow understood to be a feminine object. They also sell chocolate.

This Viennese shop, called St. Jerome's, specialized in medicine for digestive problems, constipation, gout, and even asthma. The shop carried products from many monasteries, a sales model often used in today's abbey shops.

Carthusian liqueur, by the way, is its own topic. The Green Chartreuse is famous, and was available "in better stores everywhere."

This shot shows the context in which some Cistercian or Trappist products were advertised: next to ads for Russian tea at Christmastime.

Contemporary Cistercian Art

10/12/2024

This label for a jar of honey draws attention to an area neglected in studies of Cistercian Aesthetics: How do and did Cistercians market their products? Since the 19th century, it has been a major topic in very many abbeys. They sell everything from liturgical garments to chocolate. Usually the product has some connection to the monastic life, not always.
This beautiful logo was designed by Fr. Raphael Schaner, O.Cist., of Our Lady of Dallas. It incoporates the classic Cistercian church facade with our famous grisailles tradition, connecting them with the honey comb. Then there is the fun play on words with abbey and bee. Well done!

Mount Melleray announces closure

26/11/2024

This abbey was founded by Irish monks who had assembled at the French abbey of Melleray in the early 19th century. It will close in January, 2025.
When, in 1833, a group of Irish monks returned from France and successfully founded Mount Melleray back in their native land, it was one step in the slow healing of traumas inflicted on the Church not only by the French Revolution but by anti-Catholic legislation in Ireland itself. Mount Melleray was the first monastery established in Ireland after the Catholic Emancipation. It is closing now because no one has joined in so long.
At least six foundations from Mt. Melleray were successful, with two of them attaining a certain prominence. The very first, New Melleray (pictured below), established itself in Iowa, USA.

Their successful casket company garnered praise during the Corona crisis when it offered simple caskets free of charge for those who were struggling to get by.
Another prominent foundation (see below) was Mt. Saint Bernard in England, where Blessed Cyprian Tansi entered and completed his holy life in 1964. A youthful abbot of that monastery has become the often-read, dynamic, and admired bishop of Trondheim, Eric Varden.

Monastic ruins

22/11/2024

This detail from Hubert Robert's Hermit in the Colosseum (1790) is a good example of the the genre: Architectural ruins are presented as the space for devotions, but only a select few understand their supernatural dimension. The monk (he could be a Cistercian wearing his cowl) is praying at an abandoned altar in the Colosseum, which is itself a paradoxical but compelling site, declared sacred by Benedict XIV in 1749. There Christians were persecutered, there saints were made.
The monk is framed by chattering women from the market stealing flowers on the left, and a cat who looks suspiciously like a rat on the upper right. The monk remains oblivious to them, it is his office to mourn. Notice that the flowers are below an image of the Virgin Mary.

Zur Geschichte der Zisterzienser-Familiare

4/11/2024

Dieses Faltblatt aus dem Jahr 1960, vom Mehrerauer Abt Heinrich Groner herausgegeben, setzt die Mitgliedschaft in der frommen Vereinigung "Passio-Catholica" dem Familiarenstand gleich. Das Mitglied verspricht und unterschreibt, sich als "Ganzopfer" mit allen Gebeten, Arbeiten, Mühen, Verzichten und Leiden mit den Herzen Jesu und Mariens zu vereinigen. Die vier seiten des Blattes folgen:

Miracle Melodies at Cistercian Prep

28/10/2024

When the saints go marching in

Cistercian schools are part of an ages-old tradition of learning truth, building character, and deepening knowledge. Where that happens successfully, the students' charisma speaks for itself and stretches far beyond campus.
At Cistercian Prep near Dallas, a group of senior boys called the Miracle Melodies give a few hours of their Monday mornings each week to worship and praise with the kids at Notre Dame School of Dallas. Notre Dame is for students with special needs.
These photos give an impression of the love being shared among kids formed by Catholic education and their joy in the Lord, celebrating the dignity of life and the power of hope.
Worship begins and ends with a Hail Mary ("because it's October"); inbetween the kids sing praise songs like "When the Saints Go Marching In" and "I'm Trading my Sorrows for the Joy of the Lord."

The Miracle Melodies with their form master

Here is one mesmerized listener...

Fist bumps at the end to say:
have a great day!

Click here to see a short video about Miracle Melodies made in 2023.

Impressions of a Cistercian monk's life in Rome from 1955 to 2005

26/10/2024

Father Lebuin van Midden was a Dutch Cistercian stationed in Rome to help run the order's generalate house for roughly 50 years. In a wonderful moment of serendipity, a regional archive in North Brabant, where he was born and died, has put some of his personal photos online. This rare photographic material shows 20th-century monks in medieval tonsures in papal audiences, Cistercian abbots visiting for Vatican II and attending General Chapters, even smoking cigars: they are impressions of Cistercian life so near and yet so far away.

Above, abbots taking a break in the garden. Below, Fr. Lebuin with a young relative.

Early concelebration at OCist Generalate

25/10/2024

The fathers of the General Chapter assembled in Rome in 1968 (and later, in 1969, for the second half in Marienstatt). This photo shows them at Mass, which is celebrated at the beginning of every day of the Chapter proceedings. But the situation is different, because in 1968, the small chapel in the Casa Generalizia was the site of one of the first concelebrated Masses ever to take place during a General Chapter. The picture says much about a historical moment amidst many difficult considerations and hopes for the liturgy.

Bernard's "Eight Verses"

19/10/2024

Stundenbuch (Munich) - BSB Clm 28345

Medieval books of hours often include the Eight Verses of St. Bernard, a selection of psalm verses considered especially effective in banishing the devil and his tempations. Note that the Abbot of Clairvaux has the devil on a leash in this illustration. The psalm shown at right is the first in the sequence, beginning with "Enlighten my eyes that I never sleep in death." (Ps 12) There is a deep(er) dive about the Eight Verses here.