"Many European Abbeys Will Disappear" - Norbertine Abbot General
The interview was prompted by reporting on conditions in Berne Abbey, Netherlands, where there is said to have been a years-long culture of fear and power struggles.
Abbot Wouters notes that monasteries are receiving fewer and fewer vocations.
According to him, interested people are increasingly psychologically vulnerable individuals: "Out of a survival instinct, abbeys accept such people, even though they are completely unsuitable."
Abbot Wouters believes that his order is incapable of properly training individuals with "baggage".
He warns that such people compensate for their "inner weakness" by becoming overly bossy.
"Religion then functions like an exoskeleton, as with a lobster, which has no skeleton inside: it is hard on the outside to hide the weakness within."
Picture: Jos Wouters, © press picture CC BY-SA, #newsHyyrhfftvw