BEER @MONKSOFNORCIA PROGRESS

Posted on 12 June 2018 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

We have to support our good religious orders, especially the newer communities.

Today I read about a solemn profession at Norcia, in Italy, where there is a great foundation of Benedictines (including not a few Americans).  You might recall that they a) are very traditional and faithful, b) they suffered the loss of buildings and their beautiful ancient church to terrible earthquakes a couple years ago, and c) they make spectacular beer.

Please click and visit their site.  HERE   And learn about their terrific BEER.

Here is a bit of their recent mailing.   Forgive me if the formatting isn’t quite right, I copied and pasted:

Dear family and friends,

Even though health and wellness professionals are making daily discoveries that claim to improve and extend life, a vague “fear of missing out” seems to be affecting more and more people. Fear of “missing out” feeds an unwillingness to commit to marriage, to family, or even to work for more than a few years at one job.

But when Br. Augustine Wilmeth of South Carolina made his Solemn Vows on the feast of the Sacred Heart this last Friday, promising to live as a monk until the day of his death, he gave us not only reason to rejoice for his decision, but hope that all of us — married or monks — can make the sacrifices necessary to live this short time we have on earth entirely for God.
Joined by family and friends from the United States and Italy and his brother monks, our little wooden chapel sheltered those present from the thundering storm outside, providing a dramatic contrast to the ancient chants and exhortations of the ritual:
May he be “far from the pomps of the secular world, distant from the web of life’s dangers, may he not fear adversity, may he bare injury willingly, love and care for friends and enemies alike, his deeds and heart filled with chastity, may his heart and mouth be surrounded and filled with the love of the Omnipotent God.”

These guys are great.

You can join a beer club and receive monthly shipments.  It is Belgian in style and comes in larger bottles, a dark and a blond.  It is a little more expensive that some other beers, but those other beers don’t also help the monks of Norcia!

You won’t regret it!

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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5 Comments

  1. Anita Moore, O.P.(lay) says:
    12 June 2018 at 3:46 PM

    Maybe this is only tangentially relevant, but the pictures of this newly-minted monk remind me of a story I once read somewhere about a little boy who saw a Capuchin friar with a big, bushy beard, and decided he needed to become a priest so that he too could have a big, bushy beard. It was no whim: the boy did indeed grow up to be a priest.

    To me, stories like this carry two lessons: (1) there are no small things in the spiritual life. (2) God is indeed a God of love, because only Love knows the beloved so minutely and so thoroughly, and only Love is never too grand to take special care for the tiniest details. God gives us the wonder and beauty of creation, and a share in His supernatural life in Baptism and the other Sacraments; according to our human way of thinking, if we were the givers, we would think that ought to be more than enough, and we wouldn’t stoop to giving any more. But since His ways are not our ways, if one more tiny little thing, like a bushy beard, is needed to draw us to Himself, He will not withhold it from us.

  2. Pingback: BEER @MONKSOFNORCIA PROGRESS | Blithe Spirit

  3. Atra Dicenda, Rubra Agenda says:
    12 June 2018 at 8:59 PM

    I’m a homebrewer, and I approve this message.

    Birra Norcia is delicious, I especially like what the Belgian yeasts are doing in the dark ale. I need to order some more.

  4. Liz says:
    13 June 2018 at 8:34 AM

    Aw, I wish you had included the pictures of the boys in with these. :) It has to have been a highlight for my son and his class from Gregory the Great Academy to have spent a few days in Norcia with the monks. My son did tell me when a couple of monks visited the school a few months ago how kind they were. They boys are on a walking pilgrimage from Assisi to Rome (they should arrive in Rome tomorrow) they are walking without or food and singing, juggling and begging for their food. Please do pray for them. We have not had contact with them but seeing pictures of them in the monks’ newsletter was a highlight for me. God bless these good and kind monks for taking the boys in for a couple of days. May God reward them. Congratulations on their new solemnly professed monk.

  5. JabbaPapa says:
    15 June 2018 at 8:34 AM

    I’ve still not tasted any of their beers, unfortunately.

    I did manage to score a bottle of the Massachusetts Trappist basic ale Spencer’s (I had previously tasted their IPA) — but I am rather looking forward to the forthcoming English Trappist beer from Mount St Bernard Abbey.

    It has apparently been about 450 years since the last time there was a Trappist beer in that country.

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