Winemaking: A Christian Tradition

 Perhaps it’s a bit cheeky to lead with this title during the holiest week of the year for Christian and Jewish worshippers alike. Winemaking and the science of winemaking is a Christian tradition dating back to the middle ages.

My first connection to wine was the pale red liquid used to fill cruets in celebration of the Catholic mass. As an altar boy, this was both an honor and sacred duty.  This celebration was closely aligned to the events of the Last Supper where wine was served.

Long before my experience, Christian monastic orders served as the main resource for spiritual academic and cultural knowledge in Europe. Two monastic orders in particular-- the Benedictine, and their spin off the Cistercians, invested time, sweat, equity and research in creating a methodology for growing grapes and wine making. As luck would have it, the Benedictines base of operations was the Burgundy region of France. 

As the stature of the Benedictines grew, they attracted many followers including many wealthy Burgundians. These benefactors assumed their patronage would elevate their stature in society and guarantee their place in heaven. A good portion of the gifts were land; the main source of wealth during this time. As is the case in Burgundy, much of the donated lands were rocky and infertile not suitable to support staple crops for sustenance or revenue streams.

The Benedictine vision promotes hard manual labor as of equal importance to academic pursuits and prayer. As such, through much trial and error and toil the Benedictines discovered these nutrient starved soils were the perfect place to grow grapes which flourished. The rest as they say is Burgundian wine history.

Over time, monastic wine estates expanded via new grants of land. Without the temporal challenges of generating revenues or subdividing lands via inheritance to heirs, the great estates continued to expand in size. In fact, one of the largest and most prestigious estates Clos de Vouget was originally created by the Benedictines in 1098 AD. Amazingly Clos de Vouget, through the hard work of the Benedictines has remained in continuous operation and remains as one of most esteemed wine producers in Burgundy.

It’s a fascinating tale of the Middle ages how the toil of these modest men was the foundation of the most iconic wines produced worldwide in 2017.  Whether it was divine intervention, or as they say, “dumb luck” we as wine drinkers owe much to these pious men!