Home• Welcome • History • Community • Place • Development • Vocation • Retreat • Liturgy • Monastic Guest• Lay Cistercians
Site Map • Links • Search • Galleries • Commerce • Contact Us • Events • News • Directions
Early Monasticism • Cistercian Order • HSM • The Abbey Church • The Builders • Archives
Our History
Monasticism: A Historical Matrix
More than 64 years ago in 1944, 21 Trappist monks departed from Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky to found a monastery in the wilderness of rural Georgia.  They embarked on a monastic journey that has its origins in early Christianity and which have pervaded the centuries to our day. Monasticism is a vital part of the Church. Monastic life is an institution which in the course of a long history has won for itself notable renown in the Church and in human society.

The concept of monasticism is ancient and can be seen in many religions and in philosophy. This ancient expression of monasticism is that of the eremitical style of the solitary hermit who renounced the secular world seeking liberation through an ascetic life in solitude. This devotion to religious life under vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, was known to the great world religions... MORE

The Cistercian beginning was part of a general eleventh century movement toward reform characterized by the desire to break free of worldly entanglements in order to free the soul for the life of contemplation. For what had happened to Benedictine monasticism by that time was the same process that affects all human institutions...
MORE

More than 65 years ago, 21 Trappist monks departed from Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky to found a monastery in the wilderness of rural Georgia. These men arrived in Conyers, in an unknown place with a small Catholic presence, to begin a new community devoted to God’s word. This is the first native American foundation. This community would have the unique aspect, privilege, and arduous task of actually building the place of their stability... MORE

The architecture of the church reflects an interior reality. The church is the most obvious symbol of man's relation to the Divinity, symbolic and actual locus for prayer and celebration; and the external centrality of this building reflects the basic orientation of the life being led here.

Architecture reflects lifestyle. It also furthers a particular lifestyle, a fact realized centuries ago by monks. One modern... MORE

“Georgia’s Most Remarkable Concrete Building”

That is the caption of a recently published article in The Georgia Contractor Magazine and in a special 50-year anniversary publication by the ACEC, “The History of Engineering in Georgia.”

A fitting tribute to a magnificent monastic building but most especially to the “builders” – a group of young monks who 63 years ago began this hard labor of love... MORE
Complete archives updated regularly.

MORE
Our Lady of the Holy Spirit Monastery • 2625 Highway 212 SW • Conyers • GA 30094-4044 • USA • Phone: 770-483-8705