Corfu’s Catholic Capuchin Monastery Shuts Down After 381 Years

A integer depiction of a Capuchin monk overlooking Corfu, arsenic the Greek land faces the closure of its lone Capuchin monastery successful astir 4 centuries. Credit: Greek Reporter archive

A 381-year section has closed for the arrogant Catholic assemblage of Corfu successful Greece, with the Capuchin Fathers monastery shutting its doors permanently owed to a deficiency of vocations.

A fewer days ago, the last Mass was presided implicit by the Catholic Archbishop of Corfu, Georgios Altouvas, and attended by his predecessor, Emeritus Archbishop Ioannis Spiteris, himself a Capuchin. Worshippers who had agelong turned to the friars for guidance and enactment wept arsenic they bid farewell to the past brothers, who are owed to permission the land successful the coming days.

The bid said the determination was driven by “lack of vocations,” noting that it could nary longer find caller friars to unit the assemblage successful Corfu. Without capable personnel, continued cognition of the monastery was deemed intolerable and truthful its closure had to instrumentality place.

The past liturgy marked the last work successful a religion that for centuries functioned arsenic some spiritual anchor and societal refuge for thousands of locals and visitors. Men and women who had recovered assistance determination crossed generations gathered to convey the friars whose enactment had softly shaped the charitable beingness connected the beauteous Greek island.

An aged photograph of the Capuchin monastery successful Corfu. Credit: Catholic Archdiocese of Corfu.

The Catholic Capuchin monastery of Corfu

The Capuchin monastery successful Corfu was founded successful 1642. Established initially to supply spiritual attraction to soldiers from Catholic nations stationed successful the region, it rapidly broadened its mission. Following the illustration of St Francis of Assisi, the Capuchins devoted themselves to those connected the margins, becoming a accordant enactment for mediocre Maltese migrants who ended up successful Corfu but often lived astatine the borderline of section nine due to the fact that they were Catholic.

Over time, the monastery evolved into a parish-style hub for the section assemblage and a spot of structure for anyone successful need. For astir 4 centuries, its doors remained open, helping to knit bonds betwixt the island’s Catholic faithful and the broader assemblage careless of dogmatic beliefs.

The monastery besides went though the devastation of war. In September 1943, during the Second World War, the religion was destroyed successful dense bombing. It was aboriginal rebuilt, allowing the assemblage to proceed its ministry for decades more, showing however heavy the roots of this Catholic assemblage had been successful Corfu.

In a idiosyncratic reflection, Archbishop Spiteris captured the emotion of the time connected the last mass, calling it a “sad day” and acknowledging that he, too, cried. He recalled playing arsenic a kid successful the monastery courtyard aft the war, being offered chill h2o from the well, sometimes tinged with a portion of lemon, by the friars. It was successful that precise courtyard, helium said, that helium decided to go a Capuchin, a vocation that yet led him backmost to Corfu arsenic bishop portion remaining faithful to the order’s elemental habit.

The closure leaves what parishioners described arsenic an irreplaceable void successful section Catholic life. As the past friars depart, the Capuchin monastery successful Corfu passes into history, radical anticipation that it won’t beryllium agelong until its reopening tin go a reality.

It has to beryllium noted that arsenic of precocious 2022, determination were astir 3,480 Catholics surviving crossed the Greek islands of Corfu, Zakynthos, and Kefalonia. While determination isn’t a circumstantial fig for Corfu alone, this fig is portion of the larger Catholic colonisation successful Greece, which is astir 132,000 people, oregon astir 1.2% of the country’s population.