Saint Martin’s Abbey is currently home to 20 monks. Each monk has a unique story and calling from God, and many of us would love to share it with you some time! Here are just a few:
Fr. Peter Tynan, OSB
Fr. Peter Tynan’s journey to becoming a monk begins in the small, rural town of Fairbury, Nebraska, where he attended Catholic grade school and served at Mass. As with many teenagers, he struggled with his faith because he wanted to be like everyone else. “This led me to engage in fraternity life while studying business at the University of Nebraska,” he remembers. “This lifestyle, which promised happiness, merely left me empty and feeling foolish.”
At this time, Fr. Peter returned to God and asked Him what He wanted to him to do. “To my amazement I got an answer: enter religious life. I felt attracted to monastic life, but feared the vow of stability, so I joined the Jesuits.” Though he received an excellent education, it did not work out.
He came to Saint Martin’s to try monastic life and put his Master of Library Science to work in the library. “I found at Saint Martin’s what I was seeking deep down: confreres who support me through thick and thin, a life balanced between work and prayer, and a place of beauty and peace where meditation and contemplation are possible.” Fr. Peter was ordained a priest in 2011 and is currently serving as our university’s chaplain and is working on a Doctor of Ministry.
Br. Damien-Joseph Rappuhn, OSB
Brother Damien-Joseph Rappuhn, OSB, is an “army brat,” having lived in dozens of cities across the world before landing in college at Western Washington University, where he received his degree in English in 2010. After a career in web marketing and ebook development, he took up a position as Web Content Manager for Saint Martin’s University, and from there discerned his way into the abbey in 2016. He was given the name “Damien-Joseph” after St. Damien of Molokai and his successor, Joseph Dutton. He made solemn vows in 2021.
Br. Damien is our social media and website content manager. But good luck finding him! During the school year, he studies for priesthood at Mount Angel Seminary in Mount Angel, OR, with an expected graduation date of 2026. During summers, he travels to conferences and directs vocation retreats at the abbey. He has a passion for cooking, brewing, gardening, higher learning, and of course, the sacramental life.
Br. Nicolaus Wilson, OSB
Br. Nicolaus was born in Portland, Oregon and lived his early years east of the city in the town of Sandy, the “gateway to Mt. Hood.” Upon graduating from high school he spent four years in the Marine Corps as an artillery unit driver. Gradually, an inclination toward a vocation in religious life that began as a young altar boy at the age of nine was rekindled. His experience of discipline, community, and shared mission and values in the Marine Corps led him to consider taking on a similar life of community as lived by Benedictine monks.
“In discerning God’s call for what I should do with my life,” Br. Nicolaus remembers, “I came to the realization that instead of praying ‘what do you want me to do, God?’ I should, instead consider how God has already acted in my life up to now. What gifts has he blessed me with, and how could I best use them to serve the world? What weaknesses and shortcomings do I still need to work on and how best can I do so? When I did that, it soon became clear to me that the structured monastic life in community would not only have all of the tools I would need to strive for holiness, but also that I had a good temperament and the right gifts to thrive in community.”
Br. Nicolaus joined St. Martin’s Abbey in 2008, shortly after completing a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Philosophy with a minor in Geology at Portland State University. He later completed a Master of Arts in Theology through Mount Angel Seminary in 2017. He currently serves as Prior of St. Martin’s Abbey as well as Treasurer for both the Abbey and Saint Martin’s University.