CISTERCIAN REFLECTIONS

Today the total number of Cistercians in the United States is forty, and they are at present staffing three monasteries, the principal of which is Our Lady of Spring Bank in Okauchee, Wisconsin, in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. This monastery lays stress on the contemplative life, and, with few exceptions, the work of the monastery is carried on within the limits of the monastic property. Retreat and farm work, and a variety of many other forms of work, both manual and intellectual, are performed at the monastery.
More than 800 years have stretched between the first Cistercian monastery, built in the wild swamps of Citeaux, and the American monastery which follows a life of prayer on the beautiful shores of a Wisconsin lake; but the spirit of Saint Robert of Champagne, now as then, still casts its radiance upon the destinies of the White Monks.