I read a lot about the middle ages-probably the hight point for the monastic life style. Today, the monastic life seems to be in decline-a lot of abbeys have closed, and most of the monks are advanced in age. I would like to hear from any former monks/nuns, and learn why they chose to abandon the life. Does a monastic lifestyle make you wiser or more at peace? Also, I am contemplating spending a few days in amonastery-shall I expect any great revelations from God as a result of this?
Finally, is this lifestyle boring? Do people leave out of boredom?
"I read a lot about the middle ages-probably the hight point for the monastic life style."
If you’re talking about the numbers of monks, you’re probably right. Generally, if you didn’t get married, you either became a monk or a nun. Generally. Meaning there were exceptions.
"Today, the monastic life seems to be in decline-a lot of abbeys have closed, and most of the monks are advanced in age. I would like to hear from any former monks/nuns, and learn why they chose to abandon the life."
I don’t think you’re going to find a lot of those - certainly not on here.
I myself know OF only one person who ever did that. He basically showed up at the abbot’s office with his suitcase and said “I wish to be relieved of my vows.” From what I hear (from my father, who was a student at the accompanying school at the time), he was going to get married.
"Does a monastic lifestyle make you wiser or more at peace?"
As one priest put it to me, “There’s a lot to read, and a lot of time to read, sometimes.” Basically, a lot of time is left, if you don’t have a school to run, for contemplative prayer and reading. Lots of reasons for this, which I won’t get into for two reasons: 1. I don’t know a lot about it. 2. It would take boatloads of time to say what I do know. But in general, if you read and pray, yeah you’re probably going to know more and be happier. that is, if you’re not struggling with the decision to ask to be relieved of your vows.
"Also, I am contemplating spending a few days in a monastery-shall I expect any great revelations from God as a result of this?"
Interesting word choice . . . shall you? I don’t know. That’s up to you to decide, as shall indicates that you will or might DO something. As for revelations, they come from everywhere. Back around the beginning of this century a few girls over in Fatima (I believe) started claiming they were getting visions in a field from Mary. It takes all kinds.
"Finally, is this lifestyle boring? Do people leave out of boredom?"
If it were boring to the people who live it, do you honestly think they’d do it? Those who choose a religious vocation do so because it appeals to them. Those who leave do so because it turned out to not be what they wanted.
Do not expect any revelations. (The RCC doesn’t put much stock in them anyway.) You should find ample time to ponder, reflect, and be with yourself. If this leads you to more peace, then that is great. If you come in expecting great changes (especially in a two- or three-day retreat), then you will be disappointed.
How boring you find it or the monks may find it depends on where you intend to go. Benedictine monasteries tend to be self-contained farms, where the brothers spend a lot of time in manual labor. Cistercian or Capuchin monasteries tend to be places of quiet, with the brothers being called to prayer for an hour or so at a time numerous times during the day (and night). (If you are going to a “contemplative” monastery, are you planning or expected to join the brothers in prayer at each call?)
I have known a few guys who have left the monastery, but only casually, and I never heard specific reasons why they left. I know several brothers who are in monasteries, and most of them are very happy with their lives.
The day is generally regimented (much like the military). This means either that your individuality is stifled or that your are freed from making trivial decisions as to what to do next throughout the day. The criticism against this lifestyle is that people are giving up their individuality and are complacently (or, even, mindlessly) accepting another person’s will imposed on their own. The defense that the brothers give is that they are seeking communion with God, not some trivial (to them) exaltation of the self. They acknowledge that they accept routine and the obedience that seems to stifle personal goals and ambition, but reply that their internal goals have no desire for those trappings of apparent independence.
I would guess that the decline in membership is a direct result of the changes in lifestyle of the surrounding world. Going into a monastery 150 years ago was a trade-off between having the love of a family vs the aggravation of a wife and kids, surrendering your individuality vs being sheltered from the demands of feeding a family and paying taxes. Most people in the world were farmers, so farming a monastic plot was no different than farming your own. There was no incentive to stay in a world with TV, radio, movies, video games, cars, etc., because the lay people did not have them either. With the industrial revolution, the “outside world” has offered more and more incentives to remain here (although it is more complex than this simplistic statement).
As to the peace, I would expect that to develop over time. It doesn’t come with the habit being pulled over one’s head.
As someone who used to go out with priests and monks I should tell you of the ones who left they typically left because they thought being gay and coming out was not compatible with being in the out and in the priesthood. My good friend Bruce, came completely out of the closet while in the monestary. He remained celibate until he quit the priesthood. Anyway, he is still a lay brother but he won’t go back in because he does not feel that being sexually active even with a man is in the spirit of the priesthood. Of the priests and monks that I know who are sexually active and remain in the priesthood, they typically rationalize that having sex with another man is not really having sex since sex is strictly between a man and a woman. That sounds like crap to me but it is sometimes a real nice workaround if the priest is exceptionally cute. 
HUGS!
Sqrl
From the Catholic Encyclopedia:
If you want to be a monk, and are worried about boredom, I would recommend you try being a Gyrovagi first. That lifestyle has its boring moments, but it beats being cooped up all say.
Of course, I don’t think the RCC has any Gyrovagi orders at the present time, but don’t let that stop you.
I forget why I left that lifestyle. I think I just lost my faith in general. It doesn’t help that there aren’t many monasties to wander to or from. 
You should also keep in mind Matthew 5:3-37
I think this thread will get a better reception in IMHO. I’ll shoot it over there now.
Thanks for the info. I am particularly interested in the communion with God stuff-do monks report feeling closer to God than us ordinary folk?
Also, the monastic lifestyle appears to be fairley stress-free; do monks live longer than the rest of us as a result?
jmullaney,
I had no idea you were ever a monk. I guess it never came up in conversation. How long ago was this?
I’m not a monk, but I did spend the last four years of my life studying medieval monasticism. Before I open the flood gates, I figured I would ask if you wanted more information about the origins and development of monasticism. I can suggest some readings precisely about communing with God and the monastic lifestyle.
MR
Well, I wasn’t exactly a monk in the post-Benedictine sense of the word, since St. Benedict’s rule basically concludes all wandering preachers, or Gyrovagi, are inherently evil. (Funny for a religion that was supposedly founded by a wandering preacher to eat its own, but that is another story). But I was a person who attempted to keep the evangelical councils back in the day, and took the opportunity to travel while I was at it. That was 4 years ago for 6 months. So I lived the lifestyle, in so much as anyone who keeps the councils outside of a monastery would have a similar experience. But just because a Franciscan and a gutter-punk both wear hoodies don’t make them the same thing.
Thanks for the explanation, jmullaney.
I don’t doubt you, jmullaney, but your words strike me oddly. Where in the Benedictine rule does it say that people who break the rule of stabilitas are inherently evil? Is this your own hyperbole or do you really believe this? I know what Benedict says about them in the first chapter of the rule, but the Gyrovagi that St. Benedict railed against is a far cry from the Franciscan Order.
So were you a monk or were you a Franciscan? Or did you just wander around and preach?
MR
Well, the Catholic Encyclopedia, on a gloss of his rule, says:
So, maybe I’m exagerating but it would be the fault of the gloss. I have heard that Benedict, after his 40 days in the desert, concluded that the religious should only live in monasteries and no other way – but I also know better than to believe everything TV tells me as they gloss worse than anyone.
I didn’t mean to confuse you with the hoodie issue. I don’t know if I was a monk, unless we can agree on what a monk is. I wasn’t a Catholic monk, in any case, although I often went to mass when possible at the time.
A monk is someone who takes holy orders. Bottom line. You make your vows to a particular monastic organization, be it Benedictine, Cistercian, Carthusian, etc. I don’t think there is wide range of definition here.
The Gyrovagi Benedict had such vitriol for were a 6th century problem. Second Lateran of 1215 permitted mendicant religious orders, since they had already begun to proliferate by the end of the twelfth century.
The only sect of Christianity which embraces monastic asceticism is the Catholic church. Either you said your vows and took holy orders or you didn’t.
MR
SqrlCub, on the gay priests/monastics he’s dated:
Wow! Bill Clinton’s greatest contribution to moral theology is being carried on in the lives of the religious!
I’m not sure that the Orthodox would like you calling them Catholic, and I’m prety sure there are a few places where their members practice monastic asceticism.
(Had you said “Western Christianity” I believe that you might be correct. I don’t recall any monastic orders in the Church of England.)
For whatever reason, I was thinking only of the distinction between Catholics and Protestants. Hence western Christianity. And from its earliest beginnings, the Church of England persecuted monastic orders, and created none of its own.
MR
Tom, there are numerous orders of religious (in the strict sense) in the Anglican communion, mostly in “active” orders as opposed to contemplative monastic and cloistered ones. My wife is a professed Franciscan Tertiary in good standing. (That should boggle a few people! :))
The last Anglican Poor Clare of Reparation passed away a few months ago; a new order is in process of forming. (By mutual consent of her and her Bishop Protector and the people forming the new group, it was understood that they would not “assume” the old order without a proper postulancy and novitiate, which she was too feeble to supervise, but would establish their own.)
The Society of St. John the Evangelist (Cowley Fathers) is pretty active. There are about 20 other Anglican orders. And, apropos of nothing, the group that started the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, situated on the Hudson, started Anglican and converted to Catholicism en masse.
There is also an Order of Ecumenical Franciscans spanning several protestant denominations, with supervision from, IIRC, the United Church of Christ. And let’s not forget Taize!
However, I was interpreting the “monastic asceticism” phrase to imply contemplative (if not actually cloistered) orders. I may have presumed too much, of course. I am aware that the Anglicans have had nursing orders (and, I thought, teaching orders, as well).