OT: Can I become a Cistercian even if I’m not a Christian?

Last night, thanks to the generosity of a friend I’ve made here, the husband of a colleague, I was able to drink a glass of Westvleteren 12 Trappist ale, the beer that is consistently rated by beer experts as the best beer in the world. He had one bottle of 12 and one bottle of 8, and we split each between the three of us.

Now that I’ve drunk the best, how will I cope with the rest? Because it’s not easy to get, this beer.

The friends have a hair-raising story of how they got the stuff into the United States in the first place — it’s only sold where it’s made, at the Cistercian abbey of Westvleteren in Flanders, which only makes 160,000 cases of this particular version annually (they make two other beers as well in similarly small quantities). You have to call and hope they have some left to sell you, and then you have to go there and get it. And then you have to smuggle it into the U.S. in your suitcases. And then you have have to wait for it to ripen and not drink it ahead of time. The friend told me that we were drinking the beer very young.

I didn’t think the beer was too young. I probably don’t have enough comparisons available to me to agree that it’s the best beer in the world — but it was a.maz.ing, this beer. I will remember last night for a long time.

I was looking at the abbey website. They look like typical Cistercians. It’s a way of life I’ve long envied, to which I feel attracted but also would confess that I would be personally ill-suited. I’m an introvert, but I’m quite talkative. And I think I’d eventually get bored. Although part of what you’re supposed to supersede in a cloister is the need for stimulation. Which is a leap I’d like to make.

Let’s get real. Female Cistercians don’t brew beer. I’m not even Christian, let alone Catholic. Would anyone believe I had a vocation?

And probably the monks don’t get to drink the beer.

~ by Servetus on February 26, 2012.