A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone (hermits). A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer which may be a chapel, church, or temple, and may also serve as an oratory, or in the case of communities anything from a single building housing only one senior and two or three junior monks or nuns, to vast complexes and estates housing tens or hundreds. A monastery complex typically comprises a number of buildings which include a church, dormitory, cloister, refectory, library, balneary and infirmary, and outlying granges. Depending on the location, the monastic order and the occupation of its inhabitants, the complex may also include a wide range of buildings that facilitate self-sufficiency and service to the community. These may include a hospice, a school, and a range of agricultural and manufacturing buildings such as a barn, a forge, or a brewery.
The Carthusians, also known as the Order of Carthusians, are a Latin enclosed religious order of the Catholic Church. The order was founded by Bruno of Cologne in 1084 and includes both monks and nuns. The order has its own rule, called the Statutes, and their life combines both eremitical and cenobitic monasticism. The motto of the Carthusians is Stat crux dum volvitur orbis, Latin for 'The Cross is steady while the world turns'. The Carthusians retain a unique form of liturgy known as the Carthusian Rite.
A hermit, also known as an eremite or solitary, is a person who lives in seclusion. Eremitism plays a role in a variety of religions.
The Camaldolese Hermits of Mount Corona, commonly called Camaldolese, is a monastic order of Pontifical Right for men founded by Saint Romuald. Its name is derived from the Holy Hermitage of Camaldoli, high in the mountains of central Italy, near the city of Arezzo. Its members add the nominal letters E.C.M.C. after their names to indicate their membership in the congregation. Apart from the Roman Catholic monasteries, in recent times ecumenical Christian hermitages with a Camaldolese spirituality have arisen as well.
Bruno of Cologne, OCart, venerated as Saint Bruno, was the founder of the Carthusians. He personally founded the order's first two communities. He was a celebrated teacher at Reims and a close advisor of his former pupil, Pope Urban II. His feast day is 6 October.
Christian monasticism is a religious way of life of Christians who live ascetic and typically cloistered lives that are dedicated to Christian worship. It began to develop early in the history of the Christian Church, modeled upon scriptural examples and ideals, including those in the Old Testament. It has come to be regulated by religious rules and, in modern times, the Canon law of the respective Christian denominations that have forms of monastic living. Those living the monastic life are known by the generic terms monks (men) and nuns (women). The word monk originated from the Greek μοναχός, itself from μόνος meaning 'alone'.
Cenobiticmonasticism is a monastic tradition that stresses community life. Often in the West the community belongs to a religious order, and the life of the cenobitic monk is regulated by a religious rule, a collection of precepts. The older style of monasticism, to live as a hermit, is called eremitic. A third form of monasticism, found primarily in Eastern Christianity, is the skete.
Catherine de Hueck Doherty was a Russian-born Catholic activist who founded the Madonna House Apostolate in 1947. She was a pioneer in the struggle for interracial justice, spiritual writer, lecturer, and spiritual mother to priests and laity.
The Madonna House Apostolate is a Catholic Christian community of laymen, women, and priests, all of whom take lifelong promises of poverty, chastity, and obedience and who are dedicated to loving and serving Jesus Christ in all areas of life. Madonna House was founded in 1947 by Catherine Doherty in Combermere, Ontario, and has established mission houses throughout the world. It is recognized by the Catholic Church as an association of the Christian faithful.
A recluse is a person who lives in voluntary seclusion and solitude. The word is from the Latin recludere, which means 'shut up' or 'sequester'.
A starets is an elder of an Eastern Orthodox or Eastern Catholic monastery or convent who functions as venerated adviser and teacher. Elders or spiritual fathers are charismatic spiritual leaders whose wisdom stems from God as obtained from ascetic experience. It is believed that through ascetic struggle, prayer and hesychasm, the Holy Spirit bestows special gifts onto the elder including the ability to heal, prophesy, and most importantly, give effective spiritual guidance and direction. Elders are looked upon as being an inspiration to believers and an example of saintly virtue, steadfast faith, and spiritual peace.
The Optina Pustyn is an Eastern Orthodox monastery for men near Kozelsk in Russia. In the 19th century, the Optina was the most important spiritual centre of the Russian Orthodox Church and served as the model for several other monasteries, including the nearby Shamordino Convent. It was particularly renowned as the centre of Russian Orthodox eldership (staretsdom).
Paisius Velichkovsky or Wieliczkowski was an Eastern Orthodox monk and theologian who helped spread staretsdom or the concept of the spiritual elder to the Slavic world. He is a pivotal figure in Orthodox Church history.
A skete is a monastic community in Eastern Christianity that allows relative isolation for monks, but also allows for communal services and the safety of shared resources and protection. It is one of four types of early monastic orders, along with the eremitic, lavritic and coenobitic, that became popular during the early formation of the Christian Church.
The Discalced Carmelites, known officially as the Order of the Discalced Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel or the Order of Discalced Carmelites, is a Catholic mendicant order with roots in the eremitic tradition of the Desert Fathers. The order was established in the 16th century, pursuant to the reform of the Carmelite Order by two Spanish saints, Teresa of Ávila (foundress) and John of the Cross (co-founder). Discalced is derived from Latin, meaning "without shoes".
The Roman Catholic hermitage of Our Lady of the Enclosed Garden is situated in the former Reformed church of Warfhuizen, a village in the province of Groningen, in the north of the Netherlands. It is the only Dutch hermitage currently inhabited by a hermit. The name draws upon the traditional epithet for the Virgin Mary of hortus conclusus or enclosed garden, a reference to the Song of Songs that indicates Mary’a “perpetual virginity and at the same time her fruitful maternity.”
Eastern Christian monasticism is the life followed by monks and nuns of the Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodoxy, the Church of the East and some Eastern Catholic Churches.
The Glinsk Hermitage is a stavropegial monastery of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church located in the village of Sosnivka, near the Russian border. In the 19th and early 20th centuries it was a major spiritual center of the Russian Orthodox Church, and many of its elders have been recently canonized as saints. The monastery is under the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the diocese of Konotop and Hlukhiv.
Hieroschemamonk Leonid (Nagolkin) of Optina, also Leo of Optina, was a venerable elder of Optina Monastery and a founder of Optina's eldership.
A cell is a small room used by a hermit, monk, nun or anchorite to live and as a devotional space. Cells are often part of larger cenobitic monastic communities such as Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican and Orthodox Christian monasteries, as well as Buddhist vihara, but may also form stand-alone structures in remote locations. The word cell comes from the Old French celle meaning a monastic cell, itself from the Latin meaning "room", "store room" or "chamber".
