Top 10 Monasteries in the USA
Monasticism in the United States is younger than in Europe but remarkably diverse. Benedictine and Trappist monks crossed the Atlantic in the nineteenth century to serve immigrant communities and found abbeys on the frontier; Greek, Russian, and Serbian Orthodox communities planted monasteries through the twentieth century; and from the 1960s onward, Zen, Tibetan, and Theravada Buddhist centres took root in the mountains of the West. The American cloister blends old-world rule with new-world enterprise — fruitcake, cheese, caskets, and bestselling spiritual writing. These ten span the traditions and the continent.
1. Abbey of Gethsemani, Kentucky
Founded in 1848 by Trappist monks from France, Gethsemani is the oldest functioning monastery in the United States and the home where Thomas Merton lived from 1941 until his death in 1968. Merton's spiritual writing, especially The Seven Storey Mountain, drew worldwide attention to the contemplative life. The community supports itself by making fruitcake, fudge, and cheese, and welcomes retreatants to its guesthouse in the Kentucky knobs.
2. Saint Meinrad Archabbey, Indiana
Founded in 1854 by monks from Einsiedeln in Switzerland, Saint Meinrad is one of only two archabbeys in the United States. Its imposing sandstone church and one of the country's principal Catholic seminaries dominate the southern Indiana countryside. The community runs a major theological press and a renowned program in monastic studies.
3. New Camaldoli Hermitage, Big Sur, California
Perched on a ridge high above the Pacific in Big Sur, New Camaldoli was founded in 1958 by Camaldolese Benedictines from Italy. Following the Camaldolese blend of communal and solitary life, the monks live partly in hermitages with ocean views. The hermitage is famous for its silence, its retreats, and its fruitcake and granola.
4. Mount Angel Abbey, Oregon
Founded in 1882 by Swiss Benedictines, Mount Angel sits atop a butte in the Willamette Valley. Its library, designed by the Finnish architect Alvar Aalto and completed in 1970, is a modernist masterpiece and one of only two Aalto buildings in the United States. The abbey runs a seminary and hosts an annual Bach festival.
5. St. Anthony's Greek Orthodox Monastery, Arizona
Founded in 1995 in the Sonoran Desert near Florence by the influential elder Ephraim of Mount Athos, St. Anthony's is the largest of the Greek Orthodox monasteries he established across North America. Its whitewashed chapels, fountains, and gardens evoke an Athonite skete transplanted to the Arizona desert, and it has become a major pilgrimage destination.
6. Zen Mountain Monastery, New York
Founded in 1980 by John Daido Loori in the Catskill Mountains near Mount Tremper, Zen Mountain Monastery is one of the most prominent Zen training centres in the West. Housed in a former Catholic monastery built of local bluestone, it offers residential training combining Soto and Rinzai Zen practice and welcomes lay retreatants throughout the year.
7. Mepkin Abbey, South Carolina
Mepkin, a Trappist monastery founded in 1949 on a former plantation along the Cooper River, was a gift from the publisher Henry Luce and his wife Clare Boothe Luce. The community is known for its botanical gardens, its history of mushroom and egg farming, and a contemplative setting under ancient live oaks draped in Spanish moss.
8. St. John's Abbey, Minnesota
Founded in 1856 by German Benedictines, St. John's is one of the largest Benedictine communities in the world. Its abbey church, designed by Marcel Breuer and completed in 1961 with a vast freestanding concrete bell banner, is a landmark of modern religious architecture. The Hill Museum and Manuscript Library, which has digitized hundreds of thousands of endangered manuscripts worldwide, is based here.
9. New Skete, New York
Founded in 1966 near Cambridge in upstate New York, the monks of New Skete are an Orthodox community famous far beyond church circles for breeding and training German Shepherd dogs and for their bestselling books on dog training. Their hand-built Russian-style church and the quiet hills make it a distinctive American Orthodox community.
10. Christ in the Desert Monastery, New Mexico
Founded in 1964 in a remote canyon along the Chama River, Christ in the Desert is a Benedictine monastery reached by a long dirt road through spectacular high-desert landscape. Its adobe church, designed in harmony with the surrounding cliffs, and its solar power and brewery reflect a community that combines ancient observance with self-sufficiency in one of the most beautiful settings in North American monasticism.
Planning Your Visit
America's monasteries are scattered across the continent, so most visits are destination trips rather than circuits. Gethsemani, Saint Meinrad, and St. John's cluster in the Midwest and Upper South; the Zen and Camaldolese centres line the West Coast; and the Orthodox monasteries reach from Arizona to upstate New York. Most welcome retreatants but ask for advance booking and observe silence at meals. Use the map to locate a community near you or plan a contemplative detour on a longer journey.