Engelszell, home to Austria’s only Trappist brewery, will see its last four monks staying at the Austrian abbey soon vacating the premises. The resident monk community announced earlier last month that it could no longer maintain a Trappist life within the monastery.

The fate of the buildings, the church and the production of beer and liqueurs is uncertain. They are looking for a “suitable, preferably Catholic” solution.

According to Austrian media, it could take another two years before the monks leave the premises for good.

Founded in 1925, Stift Engelszell was a brewing operation that was launched in 2012 in collaboration with Peter Krammer, who runs the family brewery Hofstetten, located in Sankt Martin, some 30 kilometres from the abbey.

“We had interrupted the collaboration around 2019-2020, but the abbey had its own brewmaster since then,” Peter Krammer told Belga agency, who remains very surprised by the closure announcement.

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SOURCE: The Brussels Times
PHOTO CREDIT: Wikimedia Commons