Ireland - IRISH MONKS

Nov 2001

DUR 12'40"

LANDSCAPES AND FIELDS

INTERIOR OF GLENSTAL ABBEY

GLENSTAL ABBEY GIFT SHOP

EXTERIOR OF GLENSTAL ABBEY

PAINTINGS FROM GLENSTAL ABBEY CHAPEL

IRISH LANDSCAPE

IRISH PUB

MONKS ENTERING GLENSTAL ABBEY CHAPEL

MONKS EATING A MEAL

WOOD WORSKHOP

DAIRY FARM

CHAPEL

BEEHIVE

IRISH STREET SCENE

GLENSTAL ABBEY CHAPEL

In its own way it is heaven on earth, a patch of Ireland of such beauty, such tranquility it hints at the hand of a divine garden. But, at Glenstal Abbey, County Limerick, home to Ireland's only order of Benedictine monks, nothing is exactly as It seems. The grand Abbey itself is a fake, a Disneyland version of a gothic castle built just 80 years ago complete with phony sentry.

 The monks of Glenstal live as pious and reflective a life as one would imagine, committed to prayer and to God. But, they are monks with a mercenary streak in whom the commercial spirit moves strongly. Already they've released a bestselling CD with Gregorian chant, this year it's a small prayer book which is currently racking up unholy sales.

(MONKS CHANT IN ABBEY)

Their Dublin publisher Brian Lynch has never seen anything like it.

SYNC BRIAN LYNCH:
IF YOU WERE TO BE TOLD THAT A PRAYER BOOK FROM A SMALL RURAL COMMUNITY OF MONKS IN IRELAND IS GOING TO SELL THE BONES, WELL HOPEFULLY, OF ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND COPIES, PRIMARILY IN IRELAND, WELL I DON'T THINK ANY MARKET RESEARCH IS GOING TO TELL YOU THAT.

The man with the plan was Father Peter, who runs the Abbey gift store. He noticed strong sales for an English prayer book.

SYNC FATHER PETER:
I SAID IT'S A PITY WE HAVE TO HAVE AN ENGLISH PRAYER BOOK.

SYNC MAN:
HE SAID, WOULDN'T YOU PRODUCE ONE? COULDN'T WE HAVE ONE OF OUR OWN? WOULDN'T YOU DO SOMETHING USEFUL FOR A CHANGE, YOU YOUNGER MONKS? SO I SAID OK, I'LL TRY. SO I GOT A COMITEE TOGETHER OF FIVE OTHER MONKS, MORE LEARNED THAN MYSELF AND A WOMAN.

SYNC WOMAN:
WATCHING THEM, EVERYBODY COMING WITH THEIR OWN ASPECT OF PRAYER OR THEIR OWN PRAYER PACKAGE IF YOU'D LIKE TO SAY, OR WHATEVER. WE WERE ALL FIGHTING OUR CORNERS, SO AT THE BEGINNING THERE WAS NOTHING THERE, AN EMPTY PRAYER BOOK, AN EMPTY PAGE AND WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?

What the Glenstal monks did was produce a handy, pocket sized book of great beauty featuring some of these images from the Abbey's Icon chapel. The prayer book showcases Christianity’s ancient devotions. It gives readers prayer stops throughout the day, it honors the old language of worship

SYNC WOMAN:

GIVE ME THE STRENGTH AND THE COURAGE TO CHOOSE THE RIGHT COURSE EVEN WHEN THE SEA IS ROUGH AND THE WAVES ARE HIGH, KNOWING THAT THROUGH ENDURING HARDSHIP AND DANGER WE SHALL FIND COMFORT AND PEACE.

Most significantly, the book reminds Irish readers of their Celtic roots, their pre-Christian spirituality manifest in the power of nature. Celtic scholar Father Shaun.

SYNC FATHER SHAUN:
THIS IDEA OF THIS CONCEPT OF 'NEART', THERE'S NO ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF THE GAELIC WORD BUT IT REALLY MEANS SOMETHING LIKE DYNAMISM, POWER AND YOU COULD FIND GOD IN THE TREES, IN THE WOODS, IN THE CHANGING SEASONS, WHEREVER YOU WERE. THIS DIVINE POWER WAS GOING THROUGH EVERYTHING, IT WAS WHAT WE CALL THEOLOGICALLY 'THE IMMENENCE OF GOD', THAT GOD WAS VERY NEAR. WHEREAS, GENERALLY SPEAKING, IN THE REST OF THE CHURCH BODY, EAST AND WEST, IT'S THE TRANSENDANCE OF GOD WHICH IS EMPHASISED. THAT GOD IS VERY FAR AWAY, VERY DISTANT.

(TRADITIONAL MUSIC BEING PERFORMED)

The Irish prefer their culture, like their God, to be very close, worn on the sleeve. Just as traditional Irish dance and music emerge from the soul rather than imposed from above, so Irish believers put their faith In folk prayers, short, humble prayers that belong to ordinary people. The prayer book has resurrected the folk prayer.

SYNC FATHER SHAUN:
THEY ARE MEANT TO BE SAID AT VARIOUS TIMES OF THE DAY AND VARIOUS OCCASIONS LIKE GETTING UP IN THE MORNING, GOING TO BED AT NIGHT, WHEN YOU SEE THE SUN, WHEN YOU SEE THE MOON, WHEN YOU PASS BY A GRAVEYARD, WHEN YOU'RE OUT AT SEA, WHEN YOU'RE MILKING A COW, ALL THESE KIND OF THINGS.

SYNC INTERVIEWER:
AND THE SPIRIT OF THESE FOLK PRAYERS IS IN THE PRAYER BOOK?

SYNC FATHER SHAUN:
IT IS, IT IS. YES, YES.

After fifteen hundred years, the Benedictine order is as strong as ever. Each Monk takes, among others, a vow of stability, but the curious thing is that these are not stay at home monks. They travel far and wide and that's very expensive.

Father Simon carries the weight of Glenstal's finances on his shoulders, the Abbey and attached secondary school cost more than half a million pounds a year to run. The budget is tighter than ever, today even the communion wine is under scrutiny

While prayer book royalties are helping put bread, each member of this cloistered community contributes what he can, displaying talents both wondrous and varied.

There's Brother Kieron, an internationally acclaimed wood turner with three hundred or so bowls sculpted each year in his workshop from cherry wood, ash, birch and walnut, reap many thousands of pounds and spark bidding

Father Brian runs the dairy and tends the milking herd.

There's the chart topping chants and, as unlikely as it seems, hit musicals. The Brother's lyrics have already laid them in the aisles at Limerick, next stop Broadway. The one disappointment so far, popular fiction.

SYNC FATHER SIMON:
THEY TRIED TO WRITE A STEAMY NOVEL, THEY THOUGHT THIS WOULD BE A PERIOD PIECE. THEY HAD A HISTORIAN, A MONK WAS A HISTORIAN. WE COULDN'T FILL IN ALL THE BITS OF A STEAMY NOVEL

SYNC INTERVIEWER:
THERE MUST HAVE BEEN WOMEN. THERE WERE DEFINITELY WOMEN, SURELY?

SYNC FATHER SIMON:
NO, THERE WAS NO WOMEN IN THAT PARTICULAR CAST, THAT’S WHY IT DIDN'T WORK, IT NEVER CAME TO FRUITION.

But dreams of solvency persist. Among the more creative money making schemes was Father Simon's plan for large scale honey making but Ireland's cold turned the bees sluggish. He found the solution but was handicapped by his own vocation, a niggling matter of morality standing between the entrepreneurial monk and his profit.

SYNC FATHER SIMON:
I OFTEN THOUGHT, THERE'S A GOOD STORY THAT IF YOU PUT A DROP OF HOLY WATER INTO A BARREL OF ORDINARY WATER IT ALL BECOMES HOLY. SO I THOUGHT, IF I IMPORT A BARREL OF NEW ZEALAND HONEY OR AUSTRALIAN HONEY, WHICH IS VERY PLENTIFUL AND QUITE CHEAP AND I POUR IT IN A JAR OF GLENSTAL HONEY, THE WHOLE THING WILL BE GLENSTAL HONEY. I PASSED THAT BY ONE OF OUR MORAL THEOLOGIANS, THAT WOULDN'T PASS THE ETHICAL STANDARDS OF THE MONISTARY.

SYNC INTERVIEWER:
DO YOU THINK YOU MAY BE IN DNAGER OF BECOMING WORLDLY?

SYNC FATHER SIMON:
THERE IS EVERY POSSIBILITY OF THAT ALREADY HAVING TAKEN PLACE.

There's no doubt the Catholic church in Ireland, religions establishment, Is fighting to regain credibility and spiritual authority.

By contrast, Glenstal Abbey is a community without hierarchy offering connection to God without the trappings of religion. The prayer book is proving a tool more useful in the search for God than a priest.

SYNC WOMAN:
I THINK THAT'S PROBABLY ONE OF THE THINGS ABOUT THE PRAYER BOOK TOO, THATYOU CAN ACTUALLY TAKE THIS UP AND KNOW THAT YOU ARE CONNECTING IN A COMMUNITY THAT IS ALIVE AND VIBRANT AND THAT BELIEVES PRAYER, IS ACTUALLY DOING THAT PRAYER.

The prayer book wasn't designed to bypass the church yet the monks of Glenstal Abbey, by staying faithful to the Benedictine traditions, have played something of a spiritual trump card. Prayer, work and respect for harmony and the rhythms of nature, Brother Anthony, keeper of the ten thousand year old oak forest sees it as keeping to the basics.

SYNC BROTHER ANTHONY:
IT IS VERY WONDERFUL JUST TO COME BACK TO THESE ORIGINS TO SEE GODS WORK. BECAUSE WE HUMANS ARE INCLINED TO BE VERY LIMITED. I WOULD THINK MORALISM IS A VERY POOR SUBSTITUTE FOR PRAYER AND IT’S THE LAST REFUGE OF A DYING FAITH WHEN YOU START BLAMING OTHERS FOR NOT BEHAVING AS YOU THINK THEY SHOULD.

For this year at least, thanks to a small book of prayer that's struck a chord with the Irish people, the monks of Glenstal Abbey can count on robust spiritual and financial health.

SYNC FATHER SIMON:
I MET THE ACCOUNTANTS THIS MORNING SAYING THIS IS A ONE OFF FOR THIS YEAR, WHAT WILL IT BE LIKE THIS TIME NEXT YEAR? WE DON'T KNOW.

SYNC INTERVIEWER:
VOLUME TWO?

SYNC FATHER SIMON:
VOLUME TWO, VOLUME TWO, HOW TO PRAYER BY THE MONKS OF GLENSTAL, YES OK, WE'LL TRY!