Pre-1955 Holy Week Retreat for Young Catholic Women
There are three places available for young adult Catholic women to attend a Holy Week retreat celebrated according to the pre-1955 rites, held at La Petite Chartreuse Monastery, a traditional contemplative foundation, with a visiting priest present throughout the Triduum.
This retreat is offered within a wholly contemplative monastic setting, uniting the stability of the common life with the silence and solitude of eremitical prayer. La Petite Chartreuse follows the ancient Western monastic tradition in which coenobitical and eremitical life are held in harmony—a form of monasticism largely lost in modernity but foundational to the Christian West.
The community lives as moniales eremitici (hermit nuns), consecrated to and in imitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mediatrix of All Graces. Their hidden life of prayer, sacrifice, and enclosure is ordered entirely to union with God and the good of the Church.
The retreat will be structured around:
- The Pre-1955 Holy Week liturgies
- The Divine Office according to the Rule of St Benedict
- The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass
- Nocturnal Holy Hours of reparation
- Silence, enclosure, and solitary contemplative prayer
Recommended for inquirers:
- Unmarried Catholic women without obligations of state (one need not be actively discerning religious life)
- Those drawn to silence, solitude, enclosure, and the Traditional Latin Mass
- Those who have sought traditional semi-eremitical or contemplative communities and found none available
- For practical reasons, residents of the USA may find attendance more feasible
Those who enquire via the website listed on the flyer below will be provided with the location details and a detailed horarium, closely following the monastery’s regular schedule.
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