An Interview with Fr. Michael K. Holleran by Sarah L. Kaufman , a Pulitzer Prize-award winning author, for her book entitled “The Art of Grace”. The book is published by W.W. Norton & Company (November, 2015).
It was a business activity we did, and we dedicated ourselves to it as we did any activity. There was a sense of doing it for God and for the Order,” says Father Michael Holleran, a parish priest in the Archdiocese of New York. “I went to the Father General sometimes reflecting on it. Should we really be producing luxury alcohol? Well, it’s noble. And it’s a beautiful thing. And it certainly has supported the Order.”
Holleran is, to his knowledge, the only Carthusian living in New York City. On a recent Sunday afternoon, having just finished saying a Spanish-language Mass in the Bronx, where he lives, he caught a No. 2 train to Houston Street. He took a seat between a man blasting hip-hop on his headphones and a woman who continually zipped and unzipped the compartments of her handbag. “I love the sound of the subway,” Holleran said. “Ever since I was a teen-ager I have, even before I went to the monastery.”