By Michael Patrick O’Brien–
Recently I introduced a young friend, a 23 year old man who soon will join a Benedictine monastery, to some of my oldest friends, three Trappist monks from Utah’s Abbey of the Holy Trinity, formerly in Huntsville but now in residence at St. Joseph’s Villa in Salt Lake City. It was a memorable event- the past, present and future of the monastic life all together in one moment.
The Utah monastery was my beloved boyhood home away from home after my parents divorced. My mother, orphaned young, had benefitted from a close relationship with her uncle, a Vermont parish priest. During the O’Brien family troubles, she took me to visit the Utah Trappists. They befriended our family and from about 1972 to 1983, I grew up as a kind of boy monk. Before my young friend started his own monastic journey in 2018, I wanted him to meet some of my old friends, who collectively have over 180 years of experience living as monks.
We met Fr. Alan first, a Navy vet and the 93 year old former manager of the Abbey farm and cantor of the monk choir. His body has slowed him down, but his mind is sharp as ever. He looked at my young friend with tears in his eyes and provided this advice about being a monk: “Stay with it, for it is a beautiful life.”
Afterwards, we met with Fr. David, 80 years old and a former abbot of the Huntsville Abbey. He told my young friend to remember that being a monk is all about building relationships. Fr. David has written in the past, “In a monastery, there is little or no escape. The monk must put forth great effort to make many relationships work and to grow through them.”
Finally, we met Fr. Patrick, almost 90 years old and zipping around St. Joseph’s Villa (with a walker of course) like a spry 70 year old. This is a man who recently had to leave his home of over sixty years, but he joyfully told my friend: “The past is past, and God will take care of the future, so live in this moment!”
I expected to hear such good advice expressed. I think my young friend will benefit from it, and really it applies well to life outside a monastery too. What surprised me about the recent visit, however, was how thrilled these three old veteran monks were to see and meet someone embarking on their same life path.
Sadly, there are not a lot of people joining monasteries today, and these three men had just lived through the closure of their own beloved home, once known as Holy Trinity Abbey. It gave them hope and joy to see a future monk, and to pass the torch on to another generation.
