Come to the Mountain - St. Benedict's Monastery St. Benedict's Monastery celebrated its sixtieth anniversary in 2016, living and passing on the ancient Benedictine tradition as interpreted by the eleventh-century Cistercian Order. In 1956 a small group of monks left St. Joseph's Abbey in Spencer, Massachusetts to become the founding fathers of St. Benedict's Monastery in Snowmass Colorado. While living in a 100-year-old farmhouse and its adjacent barns, these monks began construction of the present monastery. A short time later they were joined by forty-five monks, sent as temporary helpers from the founding monastery. Since that time the monks of St. Benedict's have striven to follow the Rule of St. Benedict by becoming a "school of charity." The monks aspire, through the daily life of their Cistercian community, to be transformed in mind and heart by embodying Christ Jesus in ways appropriate to our times.