A building reconstructed after the earthquake at the Abbey of San Benedetto in Monte, in Norcia, Italy. Eight years after devastating arthquakes ravaged central Italy, the reopening of a monastery is an inspiration for an area still struggling to recover. — ©2024 The New York Times Company
THEY may have chosen a contemplative life of prayer, detached from world affairs, but a small community of Benedictine monks threw a very big bash recently for the opening of their new monastery on a hill overlooking the central Italian town of Norcia, where St Benedict was born.
After a Mass and a seated dinner for 1,000 – about half of them Norcia residents – the monks officially settled in, eight years after a devastating earthquake upended a sizeable part of Norcia and destroyed their previous space.
At the festivities, they served “Nursia,” their craft beer whose sales supported the restoration of the 16th-century capuchin monastery that the community had bought after returning to Norcia 25 years ago, following a two-century hiatus.
The celebration was also a moment of hope for an area struggling to revive itself after the earthquake compounded years of depopulation.
“They could have left after the earthquake,” Alberto Naticchioni, a former mayor of Norcia, said of the 20 monks. “Instead they rolled up their sleeves and started rebuilding. It gave an important signal.”
Norcia was among the 138 central Apennine towns and villages devastated by earthquakes in 2016. Two months after a temblor in the region killed nearly 300 people that August, Norcia was shaken by a magnitude-6.5 earthquake – the strongest in Italy since 1980.
No deaths were reported in the October quake, because many people had evacuated. But many houses and historic buildings collapsed, including the Basilica of St Benedict and the monks’ previous monastery. (St Benedict, who was born in Norcia around 480, founded several monastic communities, and his philosophy formed the basic precept for thousands of monasteries in Europe.)
Since the quakes, many towns have struggled to rebuild, hobbled by bureaucracy, pandemic-related delays, a dearth of available construction companies and a steep rise in the cost of materials.
For the monks, however, fundraising was helped by beer sales, “which remained pretty stable” throughout, “despite Covid and the war in Ukraine,” said Reverend Augustine Wilmeth, the head brewer at the monastery, which was elevated to abbey status in June, signalling it had taken root there.
The Rev Benedict Nivakoff, the abbot, said beer sales covered about 15% to 20% of reconstruction, with donations funding the rest.
Rev Nivakoff, with people drinking the monastery’s craft beer on the feast of St Benedict in Norcia, Italy. — ©2024 The New York Times Company
In his homily at a Mass celebrating St Benedict’s July 11 feast day, Nivakoff spoke of the “virtue of patience”. But he said in an interview that for the monks, and residents of the earthquake-struck region – some 575,000 people, according to government estimates – “it’s been hard”.
The area’s depopulation had begun well before the earthquake, with younger people migrating to cities.
“A lot of people in the area are giving up,” Giulia Bitrai, 27, a schoolteacher who shares a prefabricated home with her mother and grandmother, said on a sweltering afternoon while hanging laundry along a metal fence. “There aren’t many opportunities for young people, and the elderly wonder whether they will ever see their homes again.”
So rebuilding has also meant envisioning more viable communities.
Guido Castelli, a top official for Italy’s post-earthquake reconstruction, said substantial investments were being made in digital connectivity, renewable energy and new railway hubs.
In addition, a 7% flat tax introduced in 2019 to entice people to live in southern Italy’s dwindling villages was extended to the earthquake-struck areas.
But there is still a question of where people might live. About 11,000 families affected by the 2016 earthquakes remain in subsidised temporary housing, according to government figures. Nowadays, Norcia’s outskirts are pocketed with such makeshift neighbourhoods.
After eight years, some front stoops are riotous with flowers while other residents have added barbecues and lawn furniture.
One resident, Maria Severini, 71, lamented that her house in San Pellegrino, a town just south of Norcia, was unlikely to be rebuilt anytime soon. The town, practically razed to the ground in the August quake, remains abandoned.
Her concerns may have some merit: in some parts of Italy, people have been living in post-earthquake temporary homes for over a century.
“At least here I don’t have stairs to climb as I grow old,” Severini said. It was unclear whether she was being ironic.
Several locals, asked why they stayed, replied that it was home.
“We created this – where are we going to go?” said Giuseppe Ansuini, 77, sitting at his Norcineria, the equivalent of a deli, that he inherited from his father and has passed down to his son.
Above him, a sign declared Norcia among “the most beautiful towns in Italy”.
Tourism, a major economic driver, remains far below its pre-2016 levels, though. Then, the city could accommodate about 3,600 overnight guests, the mayor said. Now, it’s down to 1,000.
The monks’ presence has helped attract visitors, mayor Giuliano Boccanera said. They have also drawn Catholic families who moved to the area to participate in their traditional religious practices.
And the monks themselves are transplants: only two are Italian, the rest coming from around the world, including several from the United States.
“We made vows here, vows which were for life,” Nivakoff said. “Our hope is to stick to that.” — ©2024 The New York Times Company
