Germany’s only Trappist monastery — which attempted to revert to the gruelling, pre-Vatican II monastic schedule and worshipped exclusively in the Tridentine Rite — is to be closed by the end of the year.
The Vatican congregation that deals with religious orders said Mariawald Abbey, located in Westphalia near the today’s border with Belgium, had dwindled to just ten monks. With an average age of 84, the congregation said the monks could no longer look after themselves.
Mariawald was founded in the 15th century and, like other Benedictine orders of strict observance, had adapted to the monastic reforms implemented in the wake of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).
