Always Construction

Wimmer Wednesday. There was, and is, always construction at Saint Vincent. Here is a description of the monastery less than a decade from the arrival of founder Boniface Wimmer:

The construction of the monastery is still far from completed. The main building is now 136 ft. long and 3 stories high, and we make do, accommodating everyone inside. The priests each have their own rooms; students and brothers are together in large study and dormitory rooms. The library grows a little each year, and the sacristy no longer looks so poor either. Thanks to the many benefactors! However, of books, vestments, chalices, etc. there are never enough, because I always need to give of these things to the newly established priories and country churches. At any place we take over, there never is anything, neither in the house, nor in the stable, nor in the barn, and most often there is actually neither a house nor a barn. The poorest places are always the churches. Thus there is never an end to the need for buying things, and there is never enough of anything, sometimes not even of patience, which I need to give all the time and don’t have enough myself.

—From Boniface Wimmer: Abbot of Saint Vincent in Pennsylvania