Mount Angel Oregon

Every year in September Mount Angel holds their annual Oktoberfest. The Weingarten has a rustic Old-World feel. Large wooden beams overhead with sawdust on the floor, Bavarian chalets are the bars serving beer and wines.

The Biergarten is their Festhalle, a beautiful building with a hardwood dance floor. Suitable for dancing all day and into the night. The days begin with classical polka and as evening approaches moves into traditional biergarten tunes and ramps up to Alpine Rock when Die Schlauberger takes the stage.

The newest garten is the Engelgarten (a.k.a. Angel Garden) and 2022 was its inaugural year. This biergarten is located on the north end of Garfield Street, in the Arts and Crafts area. Watch for the banner flying Garfield Street to lead you in.

In the Alpinegarten there is not a bad seat in the house. This premium entertainment venue requires admission. Everyone has a great view of the stage and all of the wonderful entertainers. This is the place for audience participation, and everyone is a part of the fun. This is the venue to meet with your family and friends and you may even make new friends! The Alpinegarten is open to all ages during its operating hours, so bring the kids. It also has a terrific selection of both German and craft beers, wines, with a tasty cider and a seltzer to fit everyone tastes. These offerings represent the best of centuries old brewing German traditions and great representations of Oregon Craft brewers.

The Prostgarten is a hidden treasure in downtown Mount Angel. At the corner of Garfield and College St, it is located behind the Glockenspiel and a row of food booths. Inside the Prostgarten you will hear acoustic accordion music that allows for easy conversation. The beers are primarily Oregon’s Craft finest; these beers are from small local brewers that are self-distributed. These are beers that are rarely available outside of their hometowns so get a glass of wine or a tasty craft beer and bring your favorite foods from the outside food booths and relax. The Prostgarten offers free admittance and is a locals’ place to meet with friends and family.

Here are a couple of pictures of the Glockenspiel.

The Oktoberfest Kindergarten is a special place for the family. Open on Friday, Saturday and Sunday of Oktoberfest from 11:00am to 5:00pm. The Kindergarten is fun for families, and fun that doesn’t even touch the pocketbook; there is no admission, no ride tickets; just come and enjoy! Located On the grounds of St. Mary Public School next to the church. Just follow the steeple, when you near the church, you will hear the sounds of laughter and squeals of delight that will guide you the rest of the way. There are all sorts of rides here for the kids along with a balloon house and playground items.

Hopfengarten (aka the Hop Garden). opened in 2018. Named the Hop Garden in honor of the hop harvest. The venue is modeled after the successful Prostgarten, and has no cover charge.

While I was here there was also a car show going on and I loved the cars. I took too many pictures to post them all but here are a couple of my favorites.

If you know me, I'm always into strange and obscure so I loved this car!!

After spending so time in downtown Mount Angel I decided to take a trip to the Mount Angel Abbey. The monks of Mount Angel Abbey in Oregon form a Benedictine community founded in 1882 from the Abbey of Engelberg in Switzerland. They maintain a monastic tradition that has been a vital part of the Roman Catholic Church for more than 1,500 years. Responding to God’s call to holiness and preferring nothing whatsoever to Christ, they dedicate their lives, under a Rule and an abbot to a life of prayer and work.

There are some hiking trails here and the most common one is the stations of the cross. If you do this hike, be ready because it does go down a pretty steep hill and follows the road to the main Abbey.

Life as monks at the Abbey is a gentle and regular rhythm of prayer and work. In addition to gathering six times each day to pray together, they spend time alone in contemplative prayer, spiritual reading and personal devotions. Silence is diligently cultivated in the monastery, especially at night, to maintain a prayerful quiet in the house of God and in the souls of the monks.

The monks of this monastery take the monastic vows of obedience, stability and “conversatio morum,” that is often translated as “conversion of life” or morals. Their obedience is to Christ and his Church. They live this obedience under a Rule and an abbot. The abbot rules the monastery more by example than by legislation; the Holy Rule is an assistance and guide in following the Holy Gospel. Stability has been described as the vows that stops them from running from the cross.

“The man of God, Benedict, among the many wonderful works that made him famous in this world, was also conspicuous for his teaching: for he wrote a Rule for monks, remarkable for discretion and rich in instruction. If anyone desires to know more deeply the life and character of the man, he may find in the ordinances of the Rule the exact image of his whole government: for the holy man cannot possibly have taught otherwise than as he lived.”

– Pope Saint Gregory the Great

The Chapel and Mass Times

• Saturday: Saturday: 5:30 PM

• Sunday: Sunday: 7:30 AM10:00 AM 12:30 PM Spanish

• Mon-Fri 7:00 AM Morning Prayer proceeds Mass, starting at 6:50 AM

In the entrance hall of Mount Angel Abbey’s Museum, there is a space for showcasing original art. Dozens of new exhibits are currently on view, along with favorite Abbey Museum items displayed in the past. The integration of art and natural history provides a collection that is both educational and inspirational for all who visit. In the words of Fr. Frowin, the museum is, “sufficiently important and interesting in itself to deserve at least the leisure moments at our disposal. There is nothing so little or so apparently trivial in God’s grand world but may be made to teach useful lessons, and at the same time become an endless source of pure, interesting, and wholesome recreation during our spare hours.”

The monks of Mount Angel Abbey are proud of this eclectic display, ranging from geological and environmental specimens to art and artifacts, ancient and contemporary, temporal and ecclesial, collected from a diverse cross-section of cultures.

They even have a section of taxidermy, and The Abbey Museum is open for self-guided tours Wednesday through Sunday, from 10 am to 4 pm.

Mount Angel Abbey was founded in 1882 by Benedictine monks from the Abbey of Engelberg in Switzerland. The monks quickly became involved in pastoral work and in education, and in 1889 opened Mount Angel Abbey Seminary. The Swiss monks brought a sizable library with them to Oregon. Unfortunately, only a few books survived a disastrous fire in 1926, which destroyed the library as well as the rest of the Abbey. The few volumes which survived reminded later generations of monks of their roots and of the generosity of the founding monastery.

In the early 1960s, library director Fr. Barnabas Reasoner, O.S.B., approached the Finnish architect Alvar Aalto to design a new library building for the Abbey. A report of that meeting was published in the March 1966 issue of the Mount Angel Abbey Library Bulletin. Because of his love of libraries and the special qualities of the Mount Angel Abbey site, Aalto agreed to design the library for a nominal fee. The building was completely funded through the generosity of Howard and Jean Vollum, who also contributed to the library’s endowment.

The Mount Angel Abbey Library focuses on topics in the humanities and theology. Among the more than 225,000 titles, they also have a number of special collections that draw scholars from around the world.

Patristics and Latin Christian Literature

The Patristics and Latin Christian Literature Collection (non-circulating, in room 210) is a research collection containing the primary editions and scholarly tools needed to do advanced research in Patristics and Medieval philosophy and theology. It is supported by the library’s holdings of secondary works on early and medieval Christianity.

Civil War

The American Civil War collection was begun and developed by Abbot Bonaventure Zerr, O.S.B. It contains over 5,000 volumes and is one of the best Civil War collections in the western United States.

Rare Books

The Antiquarian and Rare Books collections consist of over 5,000 titles published between 1300 and 1900, most of them Roman Catholic. In the early 1980s the nucleus of this collection underwent extensive conservation and cataloging. These books are housed in the vault, in Room 208 and in the archives.

The library seats 200 patrons in 30 closed and 40 open carrels. It accommodates a comfortable reading room with current issues of over 300 periodicals, a music listening and group study room, large study tables on the ground floor, and sunlit study areas around the staircases. The library collection numbers over 225,000 volumes while the building could hold up to 300,000 volumes.

On the Abbey they had everything that a small town would need except a general store.

When you first walk into the library and on the right is an auditorium for both lectures and video conference calls.

Post Office.

The bookstore is stocked with a wide variety of books and gifts, specializing in monasticism, theology, and Catholic spirituality. There is also a selection of fine art, icons, all occasion and blank cards, devotional objects and religious gift items, as well as resources for Gregorian chant and sacred classical music.

The Coffeehouse is situated within the bookstore in the historic Abbey Press building, the Abbey Coffeehouse is a peaceful cafe-style place to stop and enjoy a coffee or cold drink, conversation, and the beautiful scenic view of the hillside and valley surrounding the Hilltop. The refinished and updated coffeehouse offers a robust menu of coffee beverages and a selection of pastries.

Near the bookstore was a water tower along with a cemetery.

The graves at the cemetery are all deceased monks that belonged to the Abbey.

The Saint Benedict Guesthouse and Retreat Center is situated on the south slope of the Abbey Hilltop. The newly renovated rooms offer views of the Abbey church and bell tower to the north and Willamette Valley farmland – some 300 feet below – to the southwest. The expanded conference rooms, meeting rooms, and terraces provide space for individuals, retreat groups, and day groups to reflect, converse, rest, and pray in an atmosphere of peace, beauty, and Benedictine hospitality.

My last stop was down the road to the Benedictine Brewery. If you do decide to go here, you will have to take the road you came up to get to the Abbey. At the bottom of the hill turn left and then take your first left and the Brewery is down the road on the left.

One of only a few breweries in the United States owned and operated by monks, the Benedictine craft beer uses locally sourced hops grown on Abbey land and water from the monks' well. These include the Brewery's flagship beer, Black Habit, which has received an enthusiastic reception from the brewing community and beer lovers.

Hop field they use to grow their own hops.

Brewers, beer writers, and craft beer judges captivated by the vision of a monastic brewery have volunteered their time, brewing suggestions, and business advice. A community timber raising, which took place in 2017, was an inspiring example of the communal nature of the project. The all-day affair involved more than 100 volunteers – including monks, seminarians, and staff from the Abbey, as well as members of the local town of Mt. Angel. The only break in the day's efforts was to gather for a prayer service in the brewery structure at noon followed by a traditional barbecue lunch. In the course of the brisk Saturday, what started as a bare concrete slab quickly became a structural frame with building blocks that defined the overall shape of the Brewery and Taproom. The frame was built from 14,000 board feet of Douglas fir harvested from the Abbey tree farm. It now serves as a welcoming place to gather, taste and believe.

The steps leading up to the brewery from the parking lot. The barn and silo are where they store brewing equipment, hops, along with other items.

The food menu here is very limited and consists of pretzels, a meat and cheese plate, along with chips and salsa. There is a food truck outside that was selling Mexican food which was a bonus. Here is the menu and this can change depending on the season.

Fr. Martin, general manager of the brewery, has been at Mount Angel Abbey since he began seminary in 1995. Between other duties at the Abbey, he has been advancing his brewing and beer-tasting skills. Other monks lend their hands in the art of beer-making and on days of brewing or bottling.

I had to try the flagship beer the "Black Habit". I really did like this beer!!!

There is a little gift shop here and you can buy Brewery items like hats, T-Shirts, Sweatshirts, Hoodies, etc. All of the money raised go back into the Abbey.

Here are a couple of pictures of the brewery.

Benedictine Oblate retreats are intended specifically for oblates interested in deepening their Christian lives through the spirituality of the Benedictine tradition. For the majority of the retreats that begin on Friday evenings, retreatants arrive in time for vespers and Adoration of the Most Blessed Sacrament in the Abbey church: these begin at 5:15 pm. Dinner follows, then compline (also in the Abbey church). A welcome and first conference are given after compline to open the retreat. The retreat follows the monastic horarium (schedule), with retreatants joining the monks for Holy Mass and the Divine Office. Meals are silent, served buffet or family style in the retreat house dining room, accompanied by spiritual reading.

Silence ends with breakfast on Sunday. Many retreats will include the ceremony of Final Oblation that takes place at the monastic community’s Sunday celebration of the Holy Eucharist. A light reception is held afterward, followed by the final of four spiritual conferences. Before this final presentation, those wishing to begin the process of becoming a Benedictine Oblate of Mount Angel Abbey can do so by participating in the induction of oblate novices, where they will receive their own copy of the Holy Rule of Saint Benedict and receive a blessing. The retreats conclude with the noon meal, at which retreatants have an opportunity to visit with one another and make plans for their next visit to the monastery.

(Retreats are limited to oblates and those interested in becoming oblates.)

Oblates of St. Benedict are Christians who have experienced in some way a call to embrace Benedictine spirituality. After a time of prayer and discernment they have desired a more formal, permanent commitment to a monastic community. By making this formal self-giving to Christ in communion with a monastic community, the oblate embraces the time-tested traditions and values of the Benedictine way. Oblates are united to the prayer and good works of the monastery to which they are associated while they continue to live out their Christian vocation in the world.

For more information on becoming on oblate, or if you are in need of financial assistance, please email Ariel Lynch, Associate Director of Oblates. To register for a retreat, email retreat@mtangel.edu.

(Please note: All weekend retreats begin with Vespers on Friday at 5:15 and end with lunch on Sunday.) Price is subject to change so contact Ariel.

Cost: $220 Single $330 Couple $115 Commuter per person