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Do you constantly confuse monasteries, abbeys, priories, or even convents? If you can't distinguish between them, you're in the right place to clarify all of this!
To start, both abbeys and monasteries are institutions run by religious.
An abbot or an abbess? No doubt: it's an abbey
Let's start with the simplest: as its name suggests, an abbey is a religious institution led by an abbot or an abbess, and composed of monks or canons regular.
Derived from the Syriac term abba meaning "father," the abbot is the person in charge of the community. He is a Christian monk elected by his peers to "lead the community": he is its "superior." Unlike monasteries, abbeys have legal autonomy.
Abbeys experienced a golden age in the Middle Ages: they numbered in the thousands. The most famous among them, founded in 910 by the Duke of Aquitaine and directly placed under Rome's protection, is undoubtedly Cluny Abbey, of which some remains exist today.
There are now nearly 400 worldwide and about thirty on RITRIT! Among them, one of the oldest is Sainte-Marie de Lagrasse Abbey in Aude, founded in 779.
In abbeys, you'll find for example Benedictines, Cistercians, Premonstratensians, or even Carthusians who most often live in an enclosure at the heart of which stands the abbey church and the cloister, like the impressive Romanesque basilica of Fleury Abbey.
What is a monastery?
We sometimes hear it said that an abbey is a "large monastery." Indeed, the word "monastery" is an encompassing category: monasteries include abbeys, priories, collegiate churches, charterhouses, hermitages, etc.
In short, a monastery refers to a set of buildings within which a religious community of monks or nuns lives. It has sometimes happened that men and women came together in a single place, which was then called a "double monastery."
Generally, these religious men or women live apart from the world, often under the authority of a rule of life, to pray and work. The best known is the Rule of Saint Benedict (Ora et Labora), which divides monastic life between prayer and work. Abbeys, on the other hand, don't necessarily have their own rules.
Did you know? From the Greek mónos meaning "solitary" or "single," monasteries trace their origins to the eremitism of early Christianity. It was later, under the impulse of Pachomius the Great in the 3rd century, that "cenobitism" would truly be born: a barbaric word to designate monastic community life.
And what about convents and priories?
Rather located in towns, convents correspond to the place of residence of mendicant orders, meaning communities depending on public charity to live. And contrary to popular belief, convents are not reserved for women.
More open to the outside world and also having guest houses, there live communities like the Order of Preachers (more commonly called the "Dominican Order" because it was founded by Saint Dominic in the early 13th century) whose mission is to bring the Gospel to the world, in the manner of the first Christian communities.
Less well known, priories are kinds of "dependencies" of larger abbeys. Once a sufficient number of monks or nuns was reached, the "mother abbey" would send some of its members under the authority of a prior or prioress.
In conclusion: brief definitions of the words abbey, monastery, convent, and priory
- An abbey is the dwelling place of a monastic community headed by an abbot or abbess. Simple, basic. There you'll find Benedictines, Cistercians, Premonstratensians, or even Carthusians.
- Within monasteries live monks and nuns. Apart from the world, they pray and work according to their rule of life.
- Convents are rather located in towns and don't only concern women. There live orders like the Franciscans or the Dominicans.
- A priory is subordinate to an abbey.
Now that abbeys, monasteries, and convents hold no more secrets for you, refine your search criteria for booking your next spiritual retreat!
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