In the absence of babies, come nuns. In Palaçoulo, a border village - to get an idea - with Fornillos de Fermoselle, in a corner of depopulated Portugal and depopulated Spain, dozens of neighbors have donated their land to raise a convent and nuns come to occupy it. It will be the first monastery that has been built in Portugal since 1892. While the authorities offer economic incentives to repopulate the uninhabited interior of the country, the residents of Palaçoulo have managed to repopulate the town with nuns, although not native, because vocations are scarce in Portugal. The nuns will be imported from Italy.
With its 500 neighbors and a density of 11 inhabitants per square kilometer, Palaçoulo offers, above all, peace and silence, two fundamental qualities for the Cistercian Order of the Strict Observance, better known as that of the Trappists.
Since 2016, Palaçoulo has been mobilized to build the convent and its lodge. The Trappist nuns are put by the Italian monastery of Vitorchiano, in the province of Viterbo, where there are no more vocations (there are 78 nuns). On the other hand, in Portugal all the Trappist communities have disappeared. So a meeting between the bishop of Braganza and the mother superior of Vitorchiano launched the idea. Vitorchiano should provide at least 10 nuns, minimum number to form a new community. Palaçoulo had to put the land, at least 30 hectares to practice the ora et labora.
The pastor, the mayor, the bishop and all the living forces of the place got down to work. The first thing was to look for the lands, the Church had some, but they were not enough; the call to the neighbors was a success, because 25 families gave up properties. The hectares were obtained, but each one in a different place. The work of the parish priest of the Church of San Miguel and, above all, his patience and diplomacy managed to put the 30 hectares together, on which the monastery is already built and a shelter and shelter, all budgeted at six million euros. In October it will open.
The hope of the authorities, and of the people, is that the monastery attracts quiet tourism, which likes to withdraw from the worldly noise, which was said before. The village pastor, António Pires, has said it in today's words: ”The monastery can help stop spiritual burnout . Today we feel an ideological bullying , of lobbies, which seems to fade the Christian identity, ”according to Ecclesia magazine .
The priest recognizes the remoteness of the place, but his spirit does not faint: “The monastery is much more than the place itself. It will be a monastery for the region, for the diocese, for the country and for Spain itself ”. And the bishop of the diocese of Bragança, leaves it diaphanous: "It will bring a new centrality to the interior of the northeast transmontane."
Mother Superior Guisy, 56, is already on the ground, watching the progress of the works and working with nine sisters, chosen for their specialized skills, in singing, in agriculture, in the kitchen or in the management. All have already learned Portuguese. The Benedictine rule requires that monasteries have to be self-sufficient with the work of the Trappist sisters who, in addition to prayer and labor, practice silence and loneliness. The ten pioneers will join 30 more in the future to ensure agricultural and poultry production and the manufacture of sweets and their famous chocolate.
"There is also a new concept here, of an associated tourism, of a production and of a different vision for the territory, which wins a national and international scale," said the mayor of Miranda de Douro, head of the region. Vision and uniqueness are not lacking. If the topic of the mayors of the world is to replicate to Silicon Valley, in Palaçoulo they have opted for recollection tourism.
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