Loss of Abbeys & The French Revolution
| Owing to a decree of the general chapter numerous convents of nuns had already disappeared before the end of the twelfth century. As to abbeys and priories the continuous wars in many countries, and in the East the invasions of Tatars and Turks, made community life almost impossible and ruined many abbeys. The wars and the heresies of Hus and Luther destroyed several abbeys. The Abbey of Episcopia in the Isle of Cyprus was taken by Islam in 1571. The Hussites took possession of several houses in Moravia and Bohemia; the Lutherans, in Saxony, Prussia, Denmark, and Sweden; the Calvinists, in Holland; and Henry VIII in England and Ireland. |  |
In Hungary many were destroyed by Solyman. With all these losses the order had still in 1627 twenty-two provinces or circaries, and Lienhardt gives a list of 240 houses still in existence in 1778. Joseph II of Austria suppressed many houses and put others under commendatory abbots, but Leopold, Joseph's successor, restored nine abbeys and with these he incorporated others.
The French Revolution suppressed in 1790 all religious houses in France, in 1796 in Belgium, and afterwards all those in the occupied provinces of the Rhine. Only a few houses were still existing (9 in the Austrian Empire, 3 in Russian Poland, and 15 in Spain), but the abbeys in Spain were suppressed by the revolution which convulsed that country in 1833. The dispersed religious of the Belgian Province had long wished to reassemble and form new communities, but they were not allowed to do so under the Dutch Government (1815-30). When Belgium was separated from Holland and made into a separate kingdom, freedom of religion was granted, and the surviving religious, now well advanced in years, revived community life and reconstituted five Norbertine houses in Belgium.
The religious of the confiscated abbey of Berne in Holland founded a new abbey at Heeswijk. The Abbey of Berne-Heeswijk has founded St. Norbert's Priory at West De Pere, Wisconsin, U.S.A. To the priory is attached a flourishing classical and commercial college. The Abbey of Grimbergen in Belgium obtained possession of the former Norbertine Abbey of Mondaye in France, and founded a new abbey. Mondaye in turn founded the priories of St. Joseph at Balarin (Department of Gers) and of St. Peter at Nantes. The Abbey of Tongerloo has founded three priories in England, viz.: Crowle, Spalding, and Manchester. The same abbey has also sent missionaries to Belgian Congo, Africa, where the Prefecture of Ouellé (Wellé) has been confided to them. The prefecture has four chief centres: Ibembo, Amadi, Gombari, and Djabar, with many stations served from each centre. The Abbey of Averbode founded three Priories in Brazil (Pirapora, Jaguarão, and Petropolis), with a college attached to each priory. The abbey of the Park, near Louvain, has also sent to Brazil several priests who have charge of parishes and do missionary work. The Abbey of Brimbergen founded a house of the order at Wetaskiwin, in Alberta, Canada. The Priory of West De Pere has been made independent, with a novitiate of its own. The other priories are attached to the abbey by which they were founded.
In 1856 a new congregation of Norbertine canons, since incorporated with the order, was formed at Frigolet. Frigolet founded Conques and St-Jean de Cole in France, and Storrington and Weston-Bedworth in England. The abbeys in Hungary have jointly founded at Budapest a college where young religious of these abbeys study under Norbertine professors, and also follow the university lectures in order to obtain the diploma required to become professors in one of the six colleges conducted by these abbeys. The order also possesses a college in Rome (Via di Monte Tarpeo) for Norbertine students at the Gregorian University. The procurator of the order resides at this college, of which he is also the rector. At the death of Lécuy in 1834, the last Abbot General of Prémontré, the order was left without a spiritual head. In 1867 Jerome Zeidler, Abbot of Strahov, was elected, but he died in Rome during the Vatican Council. At a general chapter held in Vienna in 1883 Sigismond Stary, Abbot of Strahov, was elected. At his death he was succeeded by Norbert Schachinger, Abbot of Schlägl, in Austria.