St. Michael's Abbey is a

Norbertine The Order of Canons Regular of Prémontré (), also known as the Premonstratensians, the Norbertines and, in Britain and Ireland, as the White Canons (from the colour of their habit), is a religious order of canons regular in the Catholic Church ...

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

monastery A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of Monasticism, monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in Cenobitic monasticism, communities or alone (hermits). A monastery generally includes a ...

Silverado Silverado may refer to: Places *Silverado, California, United States, an unincorporated community *Silverado Canyon, Orange County, California, near the above community; associated with Silverado Creek *Silverado Trail, a scenic route in Napa Va ...

Orange County, California Orange County (officially the County of Orange; often initialized O.C.) is a county (United States), county located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area in Southern California, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, the population ...

. The confreres of the abbey live a life combining both the monastic life with an active priestly ministry.

History

Hungarian Origins

The Abbey was founded in 1961 by seven Norbertine confreres from the Norbertine Abbey of St. Michael in

Csorna Csorna is a town in Győr-Moson-Sopron county, Hungary. Csorna is located near the Fertő-Hanság National Park. There are two districts in the town: the Földsziget and the Csatárimajor. Etymology The name comes from Slavic languages, Slavic '' ...

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

, whose roots go back to the 12th century. The founders originally left Hungary to avoid oppression soon after

Communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

officials nationalized

Catholic school Catholic schools are Parochial school, parochial pre-primary, primary and secondary educational institutions administered in association with the Catholic Church. , the Catholic Church operates the world's largest parochial schools, religious, no ...

s in 1948. On the night of 11 July 1950, word came to the abbey in Csorna that the police would arrive the next day to arrest the confreres and suppress the community. That night, seven priests left, in two groups, to hike across country to the Austrian border. Several of them arrived in New York in 1952, from which they made their way west where they were welcomed by the Abbey of St. Norbert in

De Pere, Wisconsin De Pere ( ) is a city in Brown County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 25,410 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. It is part of the Green Bay metropolitan area. History When the first European, Jean Nicolet, visited the p ...

, with whom they lived for several years, saving money to begin their own monastery.

Foundation in California

At the invitation of

Cardinal Cardinal or The Cardinal most commonly refers to * Cardinalidae, a family of North and South American birds **''Cardinalis'', genus of three species in the family Cardinalidae ***Northern cardinal, ''Cardinalis cardinalis'', the common cardinal of ...

James Francis McIntyre James Francis Aloysius McIntyre (June 25, 1886 – July 16, 1979) was an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He served as Archbishop of Los Angeles from 1948 to 1970, and was created a cardinal in 1953. He was a highly successful builder ...

Archbishop of Los Angeles The Archdiocese of Los Angeles (, ) is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory or archdiocese of the Catholic Church located in the southern coastal portion of the U.S. state of California. The archdiocese's cathedra is in Los Angeles, and the arc ...

, they first moved to

Santa Ana, California Santa Ana (Spanish language, Spanish for ) is a city in and the county seat of Orange County, California, United States. Located in the Greater Los Angeles region of Southern California, the city's population was 310,227 at the 2020 census. As ...

, in 1957 and taught at Mater Dei High School, establishing a monastic community the next year. The founding abbot was Ladislaus Parker, O.Praem. In 1960 the Norbertine Fathers purchased the site from Jack Cook, the founder of nearby

Cook's Corner Cook's Corner is an Orange County, California, Orange County, California bar built in 1884 that is popular with motorcyclists. It is located between the city of Lake Forest, California, Lake Forest and the unincorporated community of Silverado ...

.BikerWear
2 January 2010. The canonry opened a

junior seminary A minor seminary or high school seminary is a secondary day or boarding school created for the specific purpose of enrolling teenage boys who have expressed interest in becoming Catholic priests. They are generally Catholic institutions, and de ...

in 1962, which evolved into St. Michael's Preparatory School, a nationally-renowned residential all-boys high school, which closed in 2020 with the move to the new monastery. The status of

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 ...

was conferred on St. Michael's in 1984. St Michael Statue

Recent history

The current abbot is Eugene J. Hayes, O.Praem., J.C.D., S.T.L. He was elected for a life-time term as abbot with a mandatory retirement age of 75 years on 27 June 1995 and received the abbatial blessing on 15 September 1995. More recently, plans have developed for an expansion project to develop a new site, due in part to geological instability at the current Abbey. In the early part of 2018, the building campaign attained its goal of $120 million. The groundbreaking for the new abbey took place at the site of 327 acres in Silverado Canyon on 18 March 2018.

Bethlehem Priory

In 1997 the abbey founded a monastery of Norbertine

canonesses regular A canoness is a member of a religious community of women, historically a stable community dedicated to the celebration of the Liturgy of the Hours in a particular church. The name corresponds to a canon, the male equivalent, and both roles share a ...

Tehachapi, California Tehachapi (; Kawaiisu: ''Tihachipia'', meaning "hard climb") is a city in Kern County, California, United States, in the Tehachapi Mountains, at an elevation of , between the San Joaquin Valley and the Mojave Desert. Tehachapi is east-southeast ...

. On 29 January 2011, the sisters' community in Tehachapi was incorporated into the worldwide Norbertine Order. In a ceremony at St. John the Baptist Cathedral in Fresno, the first nine sisters made their solemn profession as members of the newly established Canonry of the Bethlehem Priory of St. Joseph, in the hands of the Norbertine Abbot General, Thomas Handgratinger. Their total membership is 20 canonesses, the majority of whom are still in stages of formation before perpetual vows. In that same ceremony the Abbot of St. Michael's Abbey was named the Father Abbot of the Sisters' Canonry and as such serves as their external superior.

2021 Move

In January 2021, at the start of the 900th anniversary year of the founding of the Norbertine Order, the community of St. Michael's Abbey moved from its original location on

El Toro Road There are 34 routes assigned to the "S" zone of the California Route Marker Program, which designates county routes in California. The "S" zone includes county highways in Imperial, Orange, Riverside, San Diego, and Santa Barbara counties. ...

to its new location: 327 acres on

Silverado Canyon Silverado Canyon is a roughly 2,500-foot-deep (760 m) gorge in the Santa Ana Mountains, in the U.S. state of California. The small stream it is associated with, Silverado Creek, rises on the north slope of Modjeska Peak at the elevation of and ...

Road, 8 miles away. With the new facility came a new worship space as well, the Church of Our Lady of the Assumption. Both the abbey and the church were dedicated on 4 May 2021.

Diocese of Springfield in Illinois

In a statement on 1 March 2022, the fathers of St Michael Abbey announced plans to establish a community in the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois and the creation of the Evermode Institute, a center for Catholic spiritual and intellectual formation. The community will be known as the Corpus Christi Priory. The Institute will be named after St.

Evermode of Ratzeburg Evermode, or Evermod (c. 1100 – 17 February 1178), was one of the first Premonstratensian canons regular, and became the lifelong companion of Norbert of Xanten, who founded the order in France in 1120. He is sometimes referred to as the " ...

, a close collaborator of St. Norbert. The Institute will be located at the site of the former Chiara Center on the grounds of the Hospital Sisters of St. Francis in Springfield, which the Diocese took control of June 2021 and will focus on intellectual and spiritual formation of those who teach the faith in the Diocese, such as catechists and parish schoolteachers. Corpus Christi Priory officially opened on July 1, 2023.

Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe

In August 2021, it was announced that the confreres would be caring for the spiritual needs of pilgrims at the

Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a Catholic shrine located in La Crosse, Wisconsin. It is dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary under the title of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The grounds include a visitors' center and outdoor devotional areas such a ...

in La Crosse, Wisconsin, replacing the

Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate The Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate (; abbreviated FFI or FI) is a religious institute founded in 1970 by Conventual Franciscans Stefano Maria Manelli and Gabriel Maria Pellettieri and canonically erected by Pope John Paul II in 1998. Their r ...

Vocational formation

St. Michael's Abbey accepts candidates who are between the ages of 18 and 29. The initial four years are spent in the monastery, studying the required novitiate courses followed by a two-year cycle in Thomistic philosophy, after which the seminarians are sent to study at St Philip's Seminaryhttps://oratory-toronto.org/st-philips-seminary/ in

Toronto, Canada Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

, under the direction of the fathers of the Toronto Oratory. Upon completion of the three-year course in theology the students are granted the masters in theology degree. Prior to theological studies or immediately after there is typically a one-year apostolic experience. Following solemn profession all an additional year of studies in Rome while living at the Norbertine Generalate and pursuing courses in pastoral theology at the

Angelicum The Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (PUST), also known as the ''Angelicum'' or ''Collegio Angelico'' (in honor of its patron, the ''Doctor Angelicus'' Thomas Aquinas), is a pontifical university located in the historic center of R ...

, the pontifical university under the direction of the

Dominican Order The Order of Preachers (, abbreviated OP), commonly known as the Dominican Order, is a Catholic Church, Catholic mendicant order of pontifical right that was founded in France by a Castilians, Castilian priest named Saint Dominic, Dominic de Gu ...

. The association between the Abbey and the Angelicum dates back to 1973. At the conclusion of this formation the confreres may then be ordained as

deacon A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian denominations, such as the Cathol ...

s and then priests before beginning to serve in the various ministries of the Order.Institute on Religious Life
17 November 2009. The members of the abbey wear the traditional white habit of the Premonstratensian Order.

Ministries

Priests of the Abbey serve in five dioceses in

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural List of regions of California, region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Its densely populated coastal reg ...

Fresno Fresno (; ) is a city in the San Joaquin Valley of California, United States. It is the county seat of Fresno County, California, Fresno County and the largest city in the greater Central Valley (California), Central Valley region. It covers a ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

Orange Orange most often refers to: *Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis'' ** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower ** Orange juice *Orange (colour), the color of an orange fruit, occurs between red and yellow in the vi ...

San Bernardino San Bernardino ( ) is a city in and the county seat of San Bernardino County, California, United States. Located in the Inland Empire region of Southern California, the city had a population of 222,101 in the 2020 census, making it the List of ...

and

San Diego San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...

. Priests of the Abbey serve in high schools, parishes, offer retreats and spiritual direction. Activities of the Abbey also include local parish ministry.LA Times
Retrieved 11 November 2009. An annual summer camp gives local youth a chance to experience the religious life of the monastery.
Retrieved 11 November 2009. St. Michael's Abbey is an affiliate of the Institute on Religious Life. Roughly half of the nearly 100 members live at the monastery itself with the rest living in dependent houses.

Liturgy

Upon the conclusion of the

Second Vatican Council The Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the or , was the 21st and most recent ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. The council met each autumn from 1962 to 1965 in St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City for session ...

, St. Michael's founding Abbot, Ladislaus Parker, O.Praem. (19 Dec 1915 – 3 January 2010), decided "to hold steadfast to all that was good in the old and not to shy away either from that which is new." The Abbey is well known for its use of

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

Chant A chant (from French ', from Latin ', "to sing") is the iterative speaking or singing of words or sounds, often primarily on one or two main pitches called reciting tones. Chants may range from a simple melody involving a limited set of no ...

,LA Times
Retrieved 11 November 2009. of which four albums have been released.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Michael's Abbey, Orange County, California Premonstratensian monasteries in the United States Buildings and structures in Orange County, California Organizations based in Orange County, California Christian organizations established in 1961