St. Anselm's Abbey is a

Benedictine The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, th ...

Abbey An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provide a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christians, Christian monks and nun ...

located at 4501 South Dakota Avenue, N.E., in

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

It operates the boys' middle and high school St. Anselm's Abbey School, which was ranked by the ''

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'' as the most challenging in Washington, D.C., and as the most challenging private high school in the U.S.

History

In the early 1920s, a group of Americans under the direction of Fr.

Thomas Verner Moore Dom Thomas Verner Moore (October 22, 1877 – June 5, 1969) was an American psychologist, psychiatrist and monk. He was the "first psychiatric researcher to create symptom rating scales and use factor analysis to deconstruct psychosis." He was ...

purchased a tract of land on Sargent Road, and in 1923, Saint Anselm's Priory was born. The house was formed under the sponsorship of

Fort Augustus Abbey Fort Augustus Abbey, properly St Benedict's Abbey, at Fort Augustus, Inverness-shire, Scotland, was a Benedictine monastery, from late in the nineteenth century to 1998 that also housed a school for boys until 1993. Inception It owed its incept ...

in Scotland, which provided monastic training and sponsorship for the new priory. It was named after St. Anselm of Canterbury, the eleventh-century archbishop and theologian best known for his

ontological argument In the philosophy of religion, an ontological argument is a deductive philosophical argument, made from an ontological basis, that is advanced in support of the existence of God. Such arguments tend to refer to the state of being or existing. ...

for the existence of God. Initially, the monks were housed in an old farmhouse; the first church/monastery was built on a hill above South Dakota Avenue at 14th Street in 1930. A major addition was made to the monastery building in 1960, designed by noted architect

Philip Johnson Philip Cortelyou Johnson (July 8, 1906 – January 25, 2005) was an American architect who designed modern and postmodern architecture. Among his best-known designs are his modernist Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut; the postmodern 550 ...

, to accommodate the growing number of monks. In 1942, the monks opened the Priory School, and they became wholly dedicated to teaching at their own school. As the number of monks increased, the monastery was made a conventual priory of the

English Benedictine Congregation The English Benedictine Congregation (EBC) is a congregation of autonomous Abbey, abbatial and Priory, prioral monastic communities of Catholic Church, Catholic Benedictine monks, nuns, and oblate (religion), lay oblates. It is technically the o ...

. In 1961

Pope John XXIII Pope John XXIII (born Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli; 25 November 18813 June 1963) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 28 October 1958 until his death on 3 June 1963. He is the most recent pope to take ...

elevated the Priory to the rank of Abbey, and the name of the Priory School was changed to St. Anselm's Abbey School. Former

prior The term prior may refer to: * Prior (ecclesiastical), the head of a priory (monastery) * Prior convictions, the life history and previous convictions of a suspect or defendant in a criminal case * Prior probability, in Bayesian statistics * Prio ...

Fr. Alban Boultwood, OSB, was named the first abbot and served in that capacity from 1961 to 1975; Abbot Alban died in his sleep on Wednesday, March 25, 2009. Fr. Anselm Strittmatter, OSB, was the sub-prior at the Priory in the years immediately preceding its 1961 elevation in rank. When Fr. Alban became the first abbot, Fr. Strittmatter was appointed the prior at the Abbey. He was a scholar of ancient and medieval history and theology and in 1962 and in 1963 was affiliated with Princeton's

Institute for Advanced Study The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry located in Princeton, New Jersey. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholars, including Albert Ein ...

Today

Presently, the Abbey is led by Abbot James Wiseman, OSB, who was elected the community's fifth abbot on June 16, 2011. Wiseman replaces the Abbey's previous superior, Prior-Administrator Simon McGurk, OSB, who came to St. Anselm's from Belmont Abbey in England. The Abbey's fourth abbot, Abbot Aidan Shea, OSB, stepped down after 16 years as abbot in June 2006. As of 2023 there are 10 monks in residence at the monastery, some of whom are involved in teaching, either at the

Abbey School The Abbey School is a private selective day school for girls, in Reading, Berkshire, England. Overview The Abbey School provides education for girls aged 3 to 18 years. The school is based in the centre of Reading, on Kendrick Road. The curren ...

or nearby at

The Catholic University of America The Catholic University of America (CUA) is a private Catholic research university in Washington, D.C., United States. It is one of two pontifical universities of the Catholic Church in the United States – the only one that is not primarily ...

. The main work of the monks continues to be the running of St. Anselm's Abbey School. The Abbey also has a large and active community of

oblates In Christianity (specifically the Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Anglican and Methodist traditions), an oblate is a person associated with a Benedictine monastery or convent who is specifically dedicated to God and service. Oblates are i ...

References

External links

St. Anselm's AbbeySt. Anselm's Abbey School
{{Authority control Roman Catholic churches in Washington, D.C. Benedictine monasteries in the United States Monasteries of the English Benedictine Congregation Christian organizations established in 1923

History

Today

See also

References

External links