Tholey Monastery
A Visit to a German Benedictine Monastery
Our first excursion was on the second day of our trip. We traveled to a Benedictine Abbey in Tholey, which is in the German Saarland. We were greeted by the chief(?) monk who spoke relatively no English. He passed us on to another monk, who spoke English quite well, I must say. He guided us into the monastery, and we started on our tour, during which he showed us parts of the monastery normally only the monks would see, and lectured about what life was like in the monastery.
I was not surprised to discover the monastery was running low on members; I can't imagine ever wanting to give up everything I have to do that for the rest of my life. That being said, I do respect their extremely pious decision. The sanctuary was quite beautiful, and in a little passage off to the right side of the front through with the monks and the Father would enter, there was a small piece of wood embedded in glass. According to the monks, it was a piece of the cross. THE cross. That's pretty cool. Funnily enough, the thing about the whole trip that piqued my interest the most was not anything that our tour guide monk had told us. When we were following our tour guide monk through the garden, we saw another monk doing work on the garden. Like all the other monks, he was wearing a robe or cloak or whatever they wear, yet his was made out of denim since he was doing gardening work. I found that kind of funny in an odd way, so it stuck with me. |