Let’s say I just wanted to get away from it all for a few months, or a year or something. Maybe I’ve just gone through a traumatic divorce or whatever (I haven’t; just giving f’rinstances here).
Anyway, if I were to decide that twelve months of peace & quiet, tending cows and doing menial labor in the Austrian Alps, and spending several hours a day in prayer were just the thing for me, what’s to stop me from joining a monastery?
Do you have to be a monk/priest? Do you even have to be Catholic? If you’re a Christian, but not Catholic, will they give you a conditional pass?
Many monasteries have guest houses and allow visitors to stay, either for basic holiday accommodation or for more spiritual purposes. I have made retreats in monasteries in Australia, the UK and France and done very much what you’re suggesting - joined with the monks in their office, performed manual labour etc. But I’m a Catholic and I’ve come armed with a letter from my PP. I’ve never stayed longer than about 10 days. I’ve always made a generous donation to the monastery for my accommodation too.
If someone were serious about trying out his vocation then presumably the religious order’s normal postulancy/novitiate process would apply and that would last at least 12 months. It’s unlikely that anyone who wasn’t already a Catholic would be accepted though. I’d be surprised if many monasteries would allow a non-Catholic to stay for a period as long as a year.
there is a long buddhist tradition of temporarily joining monastaries to get away from it all and do some meditating. Course that might be far from the Alps…