| Living History: Abbot Fortunat Marchand During the 2023 Raspberry Social on August 6 at the Center for Benedictine Life at the Monastery of St. Gertrude, Carrie A. Barton, donor relations coordinator, portrayed Abbot Fortunat Marchand. Here’s what she shared: My name is Abbot Fortunat Marchand. My monks and I were exiled from France in 1903 due to religious persecution. Seventeen of us traveled to the United States, establishing small abbeys in Kentucky and Oregon. Financial issues at the Oregon abbey forced us to disband. In declining health, I was under the care of Sisters in a Portland hospital when Mother Hildegard Vogler heard about my condition. She generously offered me a home at the Monastery of St. Gertrude. I arrived at St. Gertrude's in 1912 and became a guest and chaplain for the Sisters for sixteen months. I brought with me sixteen large chests of church goods, books, vestments, clothing and other articles which became the property of St. Gertrude's. In appreciation for the Sisters’ hospitality and care, I built the Lourdes Grotto for the Sisters on the hill. It is now the oldest building on the monastery grounds. The beautiful statue of Mary Immaculate, which weighs eight hundred pounds, is a reproduction of the statue at Lourdes. My hope was that I would be able to say the first Mass in the grotto. I was 49 years old when I passed away in 1913, and my funeral Mass was the first Mass said in the grotto. I had asked to be laid to rest in the grotto at the feet of Our Lady, a request which the Sisters honored. There was a small kerfuffle about whether people who were not saints should be buried in grottos, however. A few years later, when the grotto was expanded, my remains were moved to the Sisters’ nearby cemetery, where the tomb is quite prominent.  A photo of Abbot Fortunat Marchand  The abbot's tomb in the grotto.  Carrie A. Barton portrayed Abbot Fortunat Marchand at this year’s Raspberry Social. J |