Father Raphael Simon

Father Raphael Simon, OCSO, age 97, a Trappist monk of St. Joseph's Abbey, 167 North Spencer Road, died Sunday, November 12, 2006 in the Abbey infirmary after a long battle with cancer.

Born Kenneth Alwyn Simon in New York City in 1909, he was a graduate of the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), spending his third collegiate year in Germany studying philosophy at the University of Berlin. He received the degree of Doctor of Medicine from the University of Chicago, after which he interned at Oak Park Hospital in Chicago and as a clinical psychiatrist at Bellevue Hospital in New York.

In 1940 he entered the Trappist monastery of Our Lady of the Valley in Lonsdale, Rhode Island, professing his life vows in 1946. He was ordained a priest there in 1947.

After a disastrous fire destroyed the Rhode Island monastery in 1950 the monks moved to Spencer, Massachusetts, building what became St. Joseph's Abbey. Once the monastic community was re-established Father Raphael assumed duties at the monastery as a confessor, spiritual director, advisor, retreat master and published writer for many years.

As well as his brothers at the Abbey, Father Raphael is survived by two nieces, Susan Riemer Sacks of Scarsdale, New York, and Constance Forster of Chevy Chase, Maryland.

A Funeral Mass will be celebrated on Friday, November 17 at 2 P.M. at St. Joseph's Abbey. Burial is in the Abbey cemetery. J HENRI MORIN & SON FUNERAL HOME, 23 Maple Terrace, Spencer, is directing arrangements.