Montrieux Charterhouse

Under the blue skies of southern France, in the heart of sunny Provence, in a region where Christian life has been present since Saint Mary Magdalene and monastic life was rooted by Saint John Cassian and Saint Honoratus as early as the fifth century, stands a charterhouse that, despite its smallness and apparent insignificance, defies the centuries: Montrieux. A solitary site in the midst of a typically Mediterranean forest, in a quiet and seldom-visited valley, 45 minutes from Toulon and an hour and a half from Marseille, on the banks of the Gapeau. The Carthusians arrived there in the early twelfth century, joining a local monastic tradition initiated by the disciples of Cassian and continued by those of Saint Benedict, making Montrieux the eighth house of the nascent Carthusian Order.

Although the inhabitants of this hermitage, from its very beginnings, strove to remain apart from the affairs of the world, the monastery was not spared the vicissitudes of history, always turbulent and sometimes dramatic. It was severely affected by the Black Death, which left only one survivor: Dom Guillaume Petrarch, brother of the poet and humanist Francesco. It was not spared during the Wars of Religion, pillaged in the 16th century, then again in the following century, suppressed during the French Revolution, closed following the anticlerical laws of 1901, sold in 1906, and finally repopulated in 1928. During the Second World War, while maintaining regular life within the monastic enclosure, part of the buildings was given over to house a Red Cross hospital. Thus Montrieux was probably the first, and to this day the only, charterhouse where many newborns came into the world. Clearly, the heavenly Father heard the prayer of his Son: I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one (John 17:15).

Tried by hardship yet spared as well, the monastery could make its own, with Saint Anthony, Father of monks, the words of the psalmist: Today, I begin, nunc cœpi (Ps 76:11, according to the Vulgate). Rebuilt each time according to the oldest Carthusian traditions, with its twelve solitary cells grouped around the church and the other modest buildings of common life, the monastery preserves its unchanging face, where neither Saint Bruno, founder of the Charterhouse, nor Guigues, its legislator, nor Blessed Jean d'Espagne, Prior of Montrieux, would feel out of place. It is Blessed Jean d'Espagne who inscribed the name of his House in Carthusian history not only by his holiness, but also by giving the Order its female branch around 1145.

To this day, in this today of divine grace, the community of Montrieux forms a small monastic family of about a dozen monks. Coming from six countries (France, Burundi, Canada, Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic), the monks are gathered in fraternal love around Christ, alone and together, in their cells as well as in the church and other places of community life, to offer Him their lives, their adoration, the attention of their hearts at every moment, in response to the freely given love by which they know themselves to be loved and called. With our Fathers in monastic and Carthusian life, who, like lovers of solitude, followed Christ alone into the desert where, in continual prayer, He accomplishes in His Person the mystery of salvation, you have called us to walk in the footsteps of Christ and to serve the Church. That is why, in union with all the saints, we give you thanks and proclaim without end: Holy, Holy, Holy… (Preface of the Mass of Monks).

While the monastery does not welcome lay retreatants seeking renewal as is the practice in other religious or monastic orders, its doors will nonetheless be open to those who are seriously discerning a possible call to Carthusian life, provided that, following a written exchange, their approach appears to contain the seeds of an authentic vocation as a Carthusian. In such a case, they will be welcome to experience our life and to reflect deeply before God on whether the solitary and liturgical encounter with the God of Love, along with the fraternal sharing of a sober and stripped-down human existence, can bring them lasting happiness throughout their lives, to the point of making it their sole treasure and finding in it their complete fulfillment to the exclusion of all else. In this process of discernment, they can count on the support and prayers of the entire community, and in particular on the assistance of the monks appointed to serve candidates.

Is there any other good but God alone? (St. Bruno)