Abbot Elijah Owens, O.S.B.

Abbot Elijah Owens, O.S.B., is the eighth Abbot of Subiaco Abbey, elected in July 2022. Raised in the Southern Baptist tradition in North Carolina, he was received into the Catholic Church while at university and was ordained a diocesan priest for the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, West Virginia, in 1995. After years of discerning a call to monastic life, he entered Subiaco Abbey and professed his Benedictine vows on September 8, 2011. He has served the Abbey in formation, vocation ministry, teaching, child protection, museum work, hospitality, marketing, and other community ministries. Abbot Elijah completed academic studies and doctoral work in North America and Europe, especially at the Benedictine Pontifical University of Sant’Anselmo in Rome. Research at the Bodleian Library and the British Library led to teaching at Oxford and King’s College London. His areas of expertise include liturgy (St.D.) and early monastic spirituality (Ph.D.), particularly the Celtic and insular traditions of the fifth through tenth centuries. He leads retreats on prayer, lectio divina, discernment of spirits, liturgy, and ancient monasticism in the modern world. His interests include beekeeping, reading sci-fi and anime, music, fishing, hunting, translating ancient and medieval texts, and sports.