Monastery, Antigonish County Swamped by the wave of Republican tyranny after the French Revolution, and refusing to pledge allegiance to any power other than Rome, Trappist monks fled to the New World, first arriving in North America in 1802. After a series of setbacks in the U.S., and stranded in Halifax with only the clothes on his back and a guinea in his hand, Father Vincent de Paul Merle and a few French Trappist monks founded Petit Clairvaux in 1825. It was located in Monastery, Antigonish County, about 30 kilometres east of present day Antigonish. It was to be the first Trappist monastery in North America.

After endeavoring for many years to increase the number of monks at the monastery, Father Vincent died in 1853, never to see his hopes realized. His work was not in vain however, and a large group of monks arrived in 1857-1858. With such good fortune, the membership grew, and the monastery was raised to the status of an independent abbey in 1876. Tragically, fire struck in the late 1890s and the community was forced to move to Rhode Island, and then on to Massachusetts.

The monastery was vacant until 1903-1904, when it was once again occupied by a group of French Trappist brothers. Trappists are an Order that do not engage in activities within the community at large. Hence they settle in somewhat remote places where they give themselves to an intense life of prayer and penance. For their support as well as part of their religious discipline, they engage in farming and other manual labour as the situation may demand. In Monastery, they built a sawmill and a gristmill, a dam on their property, and installed a water turbine in the brook. They also farmed the land and kept dairy and beef cattle, sheep, pigs and horses.

Called to military service in France during the First World War, most of the members of this community dispersed and the monastery seemed doomed to be abandoned.

In 1938, a group of German Augustinians took over the site to escape Hitler’s persecution of religious orders. The monastery was renamed St. Augustine’s Monastery, and the buildings were rebuilt and modernized. Farming resumed, as did the use of the sawmill. The west wing of the monastery was converted into a retreat house for the benefit of lay people and clergy of all denominations in 1948.

In May 1952, a wayside shrine to our Lady of Grace was established. A high school for young men was founded in 1954 (Good Counsel Academy); in 1960 the present chapel was built and in 1972 a rehabilitation Center for alcoholics (Recovery House) was established. In more recent years, due to declining members of the Friars, the Augustinians decided to leave the monastery and transfer those who remained to their house in Mary lake, Kings City, north of Toronto.

In the fall of 2000, a new group of Monks, the Maronite Monks of the most holy Trinity arrived in Nova Scotia to occupy the Monastery. They have renamed the monastery to “Our Lady of Grace.” The New monks form part of a small monastic Order of Eastern Catholics of the Moronite rite which is in union with the Pope. They are called “Monks of Saint Maron.” They live a life of silence, solitude, liturgical prayer and work.

The monks maintained the Retreat House and have made great improvements on the Monastery building and have put up a good heating system. In June 2007, the Maronite Monks decided to leave the Monastery and returned to the Monastery of the Most Holy Trinity in Petersham, Massachusetts, U.S.A.

On September 27, 2007, the Augustinian Nuns from Rome, Italy arrived in Nova Scotia and occupied the monastery of Our Lady of Grace to look into the possibility of establishing the first Augustinian Contemplative Community of Nuns at the Monastery to revive the Augustinian presence. His Excellency, Most reverend Raymond Lahey, Bishop of Antigonish has given the Nuns his consent to establish a monastic community in his diocese.

The Nuns retained the name “Our Lady of Grace Monastery.” The people of Nova Scotia gave the nuns a warm welcome and generous support to help them survive the freezing winter cold of Canada which is very different from the hot climate of the country of origin where they came from – The Philippines. On this year 2009, six Filipino Nuns occupy the Monastery, living their cloistered life of silence, solitude, liturgical prayer and work dependent on divine providence through the support of the good people of Canada. The Nuns are blessed with a number of good persons who constantly render various volunteer work for the maintenance of the huge monastery.