Abbey of Ndanda

Founded on August 15 th in 1906 as a mission station. Erected and promoted to the grade of Abbatia Nullius on December 22 nd 1931. Reduced to the grade of a simple Abbey in the Diocese of Mtwara on December 18 th 1972.

What is a Benedictine Abbey?

An Abbey is a Christian community of man, who live according to the rule of St. Benedict (480-547), aiming to follow Christ in loving each other, preaching the Gospel and serving the people. St. Benedict puts down three basic activities for such a monastic community: pray and work and study - but above all: search for God.

The new interior of the Abbey-church.

Sixty years after the consecration of the church, the interior got a new face. 2000 the floor-levels were unified and the choir-stalls increased. 2001 the new marble altar and the lectern were installed, the seats for the priests put in front of the main wall . The right transept was transformed into a Eucharist-chapel with a new tabernacle and the former crucifix of the main- wall. Two walls, one behind the tabernacle, one behind the sculpture of Our Lady (1947 by Professor Thorak) in the left transept , were mounted as coloured backgrounds. The main-wall in the apse shows a large mural of Christ in brilliant colours. 2002 the renovation of the church was complete after the murals of the Stations of the Cross, painted by Father Polykarp Uehlein, who was responsible for the whole work together with architect Brother Andrew Kurzendorfer. All marble- work was done in the stone-mason-workshop of the abbey with material of the nearby quarry.

Gregorian Chant in Ndanda Abbey

Soon after starting to be a mixed community of european and african monks, praying the Divine Office in Kiswahili, the official language of Tanzania, we thought about singing some parts of the Office. Sr.Barbara Ruckert OSB from Tutzing was a special help in fulfilling this idea. She had studied semiology and thereby was prepared to do this job. In 1994 we had printed as a draft our small Antiphonale with the name “Masifu ya jioni”, i.e. “Evening praise”. It was just a small booklet containing the Vespers of the week. Slowly, but steadily we started singing, first on one day of the week, then on two days and finally every day. The first booklet was increased by some other ones, for advent, for Christmas time, for lent and for Easter. Finally in 2000 we got our “Antifonale ya Kiswahili”, i.e. “Antiphonale in Kiswahili”. Sr.Barbara composed this book, working toge-ther with Sr.Elisabeth Kerp OSB from Peramiho. We started to use this book in the beginning of 2001, while still using the booklets for advent, Christmas, lent and Easter. There are wonderful melodies in these books. We like to sing these melodies, that are now part of our daily life. We are thankful to Sr.Barbara and Sr.Elisabeth for this excellent work. Sr.Barbara discovered, that the Swahili language fits very good into the rules, that were used for Gregorian Chant with Latin.