Meditative Mountain Mansion

A virtual tour of the Visitation Monastery of Mont-Deux-Coeurs in the Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts. By Katy Carl.

Tyringham, Massachusetts

In a tranquil valley of the Berkshires, western Massachusetts’ gentle mountain range, the Visitation Sisters of Mont-Deux-Coeurs live the prayerful life that their founder and foundress, Sts. Francis de Sales and Jane de Chantal, wanted for them. Much of their daily routine is “hidden with Christ in God,” literally as well as figuratively.

But that doesn’t mean they want their cloistered Christian witness to remain unshared. And a good thing that is, for who among us couldn’t use a dose of silence and simplicity?

The country road loops too far off any main thoroughfare to allow the convent as a daily Mass destination for most. But summer vacationers, autumn leaf-peepers or those just taking a personal day can find refreshment at the foot of the little mountain (or is it a big hill?) where the sisters reside.

The plainness of their building’s exterior gives it a feeling that is both fresh and classical. It calls attention to the presence of Church traditions both European and American, pre- and postconciliar, ever ancient and ever new.

While the sisters have only been in this particular convent since 1990, the Visitation order has a long history in the United States. One hundred and 54 years ago, the sisters, whose successors would settle in Tyringham, came from France to found a convent in Iowa. From there to New York, from New York to Delaware and, finally, to Massachusetts, the community pursued the dream that is now fully realized at Mont-Deux-Coeurs: the unabridged Visitandine charism, lived without compromise.

The sisters work, but they no longer have to run a school to survive. Their life is fully contemplative, fully cloistered, fully set apart.

After wandering the non-cloistered grounds and surrounding area, perhaps taking a Rosary walk down a tree-lined footpath, you can step into the public side of the chapel. Partially separated from the sisters’ side by a sloping, latticed screen, this spot affords a glimpse of the convent’s prayer life.

Beyond it you can not only hear the singing of the Liturgy of the Hours, but see the nuns as they come and go.


Women Welcome

Light floods in from high, plain windows in the right-hand wall. Simple stations of the cross line the room at eye level, while a tall, carved crucifix flanked by blue-and-red rosette windows dominates the area above the altar. The style is traditional, clean and uncluttered: expertly designed for quiet meditation, for clearing your mind of distractions, for encountering God in simplicity and silence.

If an afternoon visit isn’t enough, the sisters always keep two rooms open for private retreatants. While women discerning vocations with the order have priority, any woman wishing to pray in the quiet of the cloister can schedule some time to share in the sisters’ hospitality.

The experience can make for an austere weekend, as retreatants share in the rhythm of convent life, from simple meals to monastic silence. Yet the guest rooms will comfortably accommodate personal spiritual reading and writing, quiet work, study or just prayer and restful solitude.

Whether or not you cross the cloister boundary, the monastery’s inner life radiates throughout the buildings and grounds. A sense of peace and joy pervades both the setting and the community.

The women who inhabit this place are diverse, witty, engaging. But of course: Each is very much in love with Christ and his mystical body, the Church.

They support themselves by hand-crafting and selling priestly vestments. A young nun with a marketing degree runs the website. An elderly Italian sister, a polio survivor whose embroidery and design reach the level of fine art, oversees the workshop.

While we looked over the rich brocade and needlework, one of the women who was visiting the sisters with me recalled her experience on retreat at the convent. The sisters, she said, maintained silence at every time when they were supposed to, even while they showed her around and led her through their daily prayers.

To me, this highlighted how fidelity to our vocation, whatever it may be, gives glory to God. We do his will more completely when we embrace the necessary limitations it places on us. If we struggle to get “beyond” those limits, we end up making them into prison walls, not — as Chesterton once put it — the walls of a playground.

The walls of Mont-Deux-Coeurs are the walls of a playground. A visit here invites meditation on the mystery that is consecrated religious life. It is a paradox, yet makes perfect sense, that by staying true to their vocation of hiddenness, these women make a powerful impact on the world.

They are a lantern on the hillside, silently lighting the life of the Church with their prayer and presence.


Katy Carl writes from

Silver Spring, Maryland.


Information

Monastery of the Visitation

14 Beach Road

P.O. Box 432

Tyringham, MA 01264

(413) 243-3995

vistyr.org


Planning Your Visit

The nuns begin the Daily Office at 7 a.m., followed by Mass at 7:45. Each Sunday, Thursday, First Friday and holy day of obligation, there is adoration and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. For driving directions and guidance for women who would like to visit, contact the sisters by email at [email protected].