The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict, are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, they are the oldest of all the religious orders in the Latin Church. The male religious are also sometimes called the Black Monks, especially in English speaking countries, after the colour of their habits, although some, like the Olivetans, wear white. They were founded by Benedict of Nursia, a 6th-century Italian monk who laid the foundations of Benedictine monasticism through the formulation of his Rule. Benedict's sister, Scholastica, possibly his twin, also became a religious from an early age, but chose to live as a hermit. They retained a close relationship until her death.
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.
The English Benedictine Congregation (EBC) is a congregation of autonomous abbatial and prioral monastic communities of Catholic Benedictine monks, nuns, and lay oblates. It is technically the oldest of the nineteen congregations affiliated to the Benedictine Confederation.
The Benedictine Abbey of Regina Laudis was founded in 1947 by Mother Benedict Duss, O.S.B. and Mother Mary Aline Trilles de Warren, O.S.B. in Bethlehem, Connecticut. This monastic foundation was one of the first houses of contemplative Benedictine nuns in the United States. Mother Benedict and Mother Mary were both nuns of the Benedictine Abbey of Notre Dame de Jouarre in France. Mother Benedict had grown up in Paris and studied medicine at the Sorbonne. Until the monastery of Regina Laudis gained abbatial status, it was a dependent priory of Jouarre Abbey, a 7th-century monastery northeast of Paris, France.
Dom Joseph Pothier, O.S.B. (1835–1923) was a worldwide known French prelate, liturgist and scholar who reconstituted the Gregorian chant.
Stanbrook Abbey is a Catholic contemplative Benedictine Monastery with the status of an abbey, located at Wass, North Yorkshire, England.
Solesmes Abbey or St. Peter's Abbey, Solesmes is a Benedictine monastery in Solesmes, Sarthe, France, and the source of the restoration of Benedictine monastic life in the country under Dom Prosper Guéranger after the French Revolution. The current abbot is the Right Reverend Dom Abbot Geoffrey Kemlin, O.S.B., elected in 2022.
Prosper Louis Pascal Guéranger was a French priest and Benedictine monk, who served for nearly 40 years as the abbot of the monastery of Solesmes. Through the new Abbey of Solesmes, he became the founder of the French Benedictine Congregation, which re-established Benedictine monastic life in France after it had been wiped out by the French Revolution. Guéranger was the author of The Liturgical Year, a popular commentary which covers every day of the Catholic Church's liturgical cycles in 15 volumes. He was well regarded by Pope Pius IX, and was a proponent of the dogmas of the Immaculate Conception and of papal infallibility.
Our Lady of the Annunciation of Clear Creek Abbey or Clear Creek Abbey is a Benedictine Abbey in the Ozark Mountains near Hulbert in Cherokee County, Oklahoma. It is located in the Diocese of Tulsa.
The Abbey of Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas is a monastery of Cistercian nuns located approximately 1.5 km west of the city of Burgos in Spain. The word huelgas, which usually refers to "labour strikes" in modern Spanish, refers in this case to land which had been left fallow. Historically, the monastery has been the site of many weddings of royal families, both foreign and Spanish, including that of Edward I of England to Eleanor of Castile in 1254, for example. The defensive tower of the abbey is also the birthplace of King Peter of Castile.
The Solesmes Congregation is an association of monasteries within the Benedictine Confederation headed by the Abbey of Solesmes.
Fontgombault Abbey, otherwise the Abbey of Notre-Dame, Fontgombault, is a Benedictine monastery of the Solesmes Congregation located in Fontgombault in the département of Indre, in the province of Berry, France. It was built in the Romanesque architectural style. The monastery, founded in 1091, was dissolved in 1791 and refounded in 1948.
St. Cecilia's Abbey, Solesmes is a Benedictine convent, founded in 1866 by Dom Prosper Guéranger, the restorer of Benedictine life in France after the destruction of the revolution. It is located in Solesmes, Sarthe, and is the women's counterpart of Solesmes Abbey.
Mère Cécile Bruyère was the first abbess of St. Cecilia's Abbey, Solesmes and a follower of Dom Prosper Guéranger in the revival of Benedictine spirituality in 19th century France.
Saint Anselm Abbey, located in Goffstown, New Hampshire, United States, is a Benedictine abbey composed of men living under the Rule of Saint Benedict within the Catholic Church. The abbey was founded in 1889 under the patronage of Saint Anselm of Canterbury, a Benedictine monk of Bec and former archbishop of Canterbury in England. The monks are involved in the operation of Saint Anselm College. The abbey is a member of the American-Cassinese Congregation of the Benedictine Confederation.
St Cecilia's Abbey, Ryde is an abbey of Benedictine nuns in the Isle of Wight, England.
Abbaye de Keur Moussa or simply Keur Mousa, near Dakar, the capital city of the Western African nation of Senegal, is a Benedictine monastery of the Solesmes Congregation. Founded in 1961 by French monks, the monastery became an abbey in 1984. As of 2000 the monastery was home to 26 monks under the leadership of Abbot Fr Philippe Champetier de Ribes Christofle. Recordings done by Sacred Spirit Music demonstrate the monks playing the kora harp and singing, and have reached Western audiences. Their music blends African rhythms and instruments with Western liturgical chant.
The Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles, are a Benedictine order of nuns founded by Sr. Mary Wilhelmina Lancaster, OSB, in Gower, Missouri. The nuns are also choral singers, and their first two albums of recorded chants and hymns reached number one on the classical traditional Billboard charts. They were thereafter named Billboard's Classical Traditional artists of the year in 2013, the first community of nuns to win an award in the history of Billboard.
The Abbey of St. Maurice and St. Maurus of Clervaux, founded in 1890, is a Benedictine monastery in Clervaux, Luxembourg. It is a member of the Solesmes Congregation in the Benedictine Confederation.
