Our favorite abbey is not Downton but Mepkin near Charleston at the appropriately named Monck's Corner, SC. Mepkin started not as a Trappist monastery but as part of a 1681 land grant. In 1762 it was sold to Henry Laurens as Mepkin Plantation. Descendants of Laurens, who had served as President of the Continental Congress, sold the property that was eventually purchased in 1936 by Henry Luce, influential publisher of
Time, Life, Fortune and
Sports Illustrated. An impressive landscape garden was commissioned by his wife, Clare Booth Luce, who was herself a journalist and author of fiction, drama, and screen plays. In 1946 she converted to Roman Catholicism and in 1949 the Luces donated the gardens and a large part of the property to the Trappist monks.
The abbey is open to the public for casual visits as well as guided tours. Access to the abbey church, as a monastic enclosure, is restricted to guests on guided tours and to retreatants hosted by the monks who observe lives of work, prayer, reflection, and silence. They initially supported themselves and their missions by raising chickens for the sale of eggs to Charleston area restaurants and markets. Objections raised by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) caused them to adopt the cultivation and sale of fresh and dried mushrooms instead. The abbey gift shop sells their mushrooms plus books, religious items, and jams supplied by other Trappists.
The gardens, containing the burial plots of members of the Laurens and Luce families, are especially attractive in spring.
