Trappists: theirs is a way of life ordered to pursuit of God through prayer, work, simplicity - spiritual and social values of Trappist Monks

National Catholic Reporter, Dec 19, 1997 by Michael Downey

Br. Paid held up the bag of Three Musketeers. "Come to my room after dinner and I'll give you one," he whispered. When I arrived, three candy bars were neatly arranged on his nightstand.

"But you said you'd give me one."

He beamed in reply: "They're bite size. Three make one."

We took a stroll through the monastery infirmary where he spends most of each day, stopping for a breather in the common room. Three canaries of exquisite color perched in their cages. I asked Br. Paid their names. "They haven't told us," he said. "They're quiet most of the time. They know they're Trappists, too. It takes a while but it rubs off, you know." His eyes were atwinkle as he braced his walker to continue our tour.

Back in his room, I asked: "What do you do with your time when you're not in church or at meals?"

"I do the laundry, I work in the shoe shop," he said, looking down at strong, bony hands now twisted with arthritis. Then began a litany of sage advice like something from the lips of an early desert father: "You have to do something every day. You have to get a bold of your thoughts and spirits, or they can bring you down. That can be the worst thing. You have to be kind, even when you don't feel like it."

He said he was beginning to sound like he was preaching, so he slowed his words to a halt: "I joined the monastery a long time ago. My whole religious life is summed up in what Jesus told us: "Love God and love your neighbor.' It took a long time to learn that. I still have a lot to learn."

Next day after dinner, Paul again signaled that he wanted a word with me. He spoke enthusiastically: "Remember yesterday, you asked what I do during the day. I forgot to tell you the most important part. Since Lent, I've been reading the Bible all the way through. And, boy, are my eyes being opened! Come to my room and I'll tell you what I've been learning."

For some, Br. Paul Behr is Mepkin. As long as monks have been there, he has been in their midst. He is a lover of the brothers and of the place. I came to know him over several years of visits to Mepkin Abbey.

Forecasts about the future of religious life in North America and Western Europe are sometimes very bleak. Fewer and fewer new recruits. Aging communities. Mepkin too has a fair number of aging monks -- like Br. Paul. But there are signs of new life and possibility.

Mepkin is most likely an Indian word, and might well mean lovely or serene, fitting terms to describe this storied old property on the placid Cooper River 35 miles north of South Carolina's Charleston. In early morning and evening deer roam the lawns, seemingly without trepidation. The Cooper establishes one of Mepkin's natural boundaries. Its tidal marshes are home to alligator, regal blue heron and water moccasin. Frogs croak in strange harmony.

The origins of this captivating 3,000-acre plantation can be traced back over 300 years. It changed owners repeatedly until 1936, when it was purchased by Henry R. Luce, publisher of Time and Life magazines, and his wife Clare Boothe Luce, who was received into the Catholic church in 1947 by the late Bishop Fulton Sheen.

In 1949, the Luces, through the local bishop, gave Mepkin to the monks of Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky to start a new foundation. The 29 founding monks arrived in 1949. Economic strains and the severity of the summer climate posed real challenges, but the monks endured.

The mainstay of the abbeys economy is the sale of eggs produced by a flock of 38,000 Leghorn hens who provide about 30,000 eggs each day. The monks recently have begun to gather and sell something else left by the hens: composted chicken manure. This "Earth Healer" is an expression of the enduring monastic value of cultivating the earth in an enviromentally responsible way.

Say the words "religious discipline" and many think first of monks, especially the Trappists. Theirs is a communal way of life wholly ordered to the pursuit of God through constant prayer, silence, solitude, simplicity, sacred reading, work and worship. Today, there are 30 or so monks at Mepkin, roughly the same as first arrived in 1949.

But the community is vibrant and energetic. And increasing numbers of people are drawn to Mepkin, not necessarily to become vowed members but to share in the monastic spirit in other ways. Dom Bernardo Olivera, the Argentinian abbot general of the Trappists (full name: Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance), has called for a reconfiguration of the Cistercian charism for people in different walks of life. While other monasteries seem a bit more hesitant, Mepkin has responded wholeheartedly to this call.

Though monasteries have a long tradition of hospitality, Mepkin is distinctive for its warmth and welcome. Yet this openness has in no way compromised the monks' commitment to personal austerity and rigorous discipline. Herein lies their secret. Whereas other expressions of religious life have m recent years given more and more attention to their members' exploring various options in lifestyle and different choices in ministry, Mepkin has held fast to a common discipline that has been appropriated and interiorized by the monks.