New Norcia

In 1846, the Benedictine monks arrived at a spot about 132 km north of Perth on a mission to convert the local aboriginals. And, thus, New Norcia was founded. It remains a town largely inhabited by the monks. We spoke to the young woman in the hotel bar that served us our cider and learned that she commutes an hour each way to work.

The monks operate schools to educate and spread their mission. Life was good until the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse report this year. According to the ABC News,

The report found 7 per cent of priests from all Catholic Church authorities who ministered from 1950 to 2010 across Australia were accused of child sexual abuse, but for the Benedictine Community of New Norcia, the amount was more than triple that at 21.5 per cent.

While sipping our cider, I found this tidbit of information. Although we had come with the intention of doing the tour and seeing it all, our interest in paying to support the operation was greatly diminished upon learning this. Hence, we decided to give ourselves a tour about the outside of the place.

It is a very small place by any measure. There are perhaps 150 residents at the more recent count. We could see fewer than a dozen buildings. There is one hotel and one store/service station/post office. The rest is mostly the monastery and the associated school buildings.

It is clear that other things are going on and the monks must own a lot of land. They produce bread, wine, olive oil, and nut cakes. We drove through some really large fields of wheat on the road to and from the town. No way for us to tell how much is theirs. There sure weren't many house out there.

It is a quiet place. A place one could do some serious contemplation in the solitude. Unfortunately, it is place where far too many have contemplated and acted in ways inappropriate for any human.