Talk:Caldey Abbey

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Membership numbers?[edit]

It would be helpful to know the demographics of the community. The raw numbers are available here

http://www.ocso.org/monasteries/current-statistics/

Ender's Shadow Snr (talk) 22:49, 20 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Trappist or Cistercian?[edit]

Madrenergic, Gareth Griffith-Jones - The Caldey Abbey website does not mention Trappists, only Cistercians, as far as I can see. Is the article correct? Tony Holkham (Talk) 20:31, 23 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Tony Holkham: Apologies, I merely reformatted the article text and did not add a citation. I have added a reference to the OCSO official website that lists the monastery as a Trappist/OCSO institution, but being a mobile edit I will have to template it later. —Madrenergictalk 03:54, 24 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Madrenergic: - Sorry to be difficult (or not understand), but the new ref you have included doesn't seem to mention Trappist either. Tony Holkham (Talk) 10:10, 24 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Are they interchangeable? Should they be? In my view we should return to Cistercian in both the Lead and the History sections. Gareth Griffith‑Jones The Welsh Buzzard 10:55, 24 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I cannot find any source where they refer to themselves as Trappists, although La Trappe is their origin, and they are "known" by that name. The refer to themselves as OCSO (strict observance), as opposed to OCO. Tony Holkham (Talk) 12:06, 24 October 2018 (
@Tony Holkham: Thank you for your reply! There is no need to apologise. This is my fault for failing to have been clearer in my previous response, and it is perfectly reasonable that you ask for clearer evidence, as good rigorous processes on Wikipedia should be. I believe the cause for confusion is because there are two distinct orders that both sometimes refer to themselves as Cistercian:
  1. Cistercians - officially called the Order of Cistercians, abbreviated OCist
  2. Trappists - officially called the Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance, abbreviated OCSO
Both of them have been named differently on Wikipedia because of the criteria demanded by WP:TITLE, particularly WP:COMMONNAME. However, because both sometimes shorten their official names to just "Cistercian" in informal language and sometimes use it to refer to themselves, it is generally insufficient to determine whether a monastery is OCist or OCSO simply by their use of the word "Cistercian". A monastery that refers to themselves as "Cistercian" and was extant after 1892 (the year OCSO branched off from OCist as a separate legal entity) must be one or other other, so for encyclopedic purposes it is necessary to be clear if they are talking about OCist or OCSO, unless there are no reliable sources available to prove so.
The next question would therefore be: are there reliable sources available? The source I previously gave came from the website of the OCSO (ocso.org), and it lists the abbey as one of its monasteries, which by implication proves that it is a Trappist abbey. The problem that you encountered is that it does not explicitly use the word Trappist on that particular page to label the monastery, hence I have also found a few other sources that help specify that it is Trappist here, here, and here. Would these be better?
Nota bene: While the Cistercians are sometimes called Cistercians of the Common Observance, that is neither their official nor common name. To my knowledge it is only used in a specific setting when differentiating them from the Trappists, so they would never be abbreviated as OCO as that suggests an official name. —Madrenergictalk 17:21, 24 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for that; we seem to be of the same mind, and the references help. All I would do is Wikilink the name Cistercian, so readers can see the connection. Tony Holkham (Talk) 18:29, 24 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]