Erik Varden

Fr. Varden was born in a non-practising Lutheran family in South Norway and grew up in the village of Degernes.[1] His Christian life was inspired by Fr. Tadeusz Hoppe, S.D.B. After school education in his native country, he continued to study at the Atlantic College, Wales (until 1992) and after at Magdalene College, Cambridge (1992–1995) with Master of Arts degree.[2] He obtained a doctorate from St John's College, Cambridge and Licentiate of Sacred Theology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome.

He officially joined the Catholic Church in June 1993.[1] He joined Mount St Bernard Abbey, a Trappist monastery near Coalville in Leicestershire, England in 2002;[2] he made a profession on 1 October 2004 and a solemn profession on 6 October 2007, and was ordained as priest on 16 July 2011,[3] for this community by Bishop Malcolm McMahon.

From 2011 to 2013 he was a professor of Syriac language, monastic history, and Christian anthropology at the Pontifical Atheneum of St. Anselm in Rome.[2]

Father Varden left teaching at St. Anselm in Rome and returned to his Abbey in 2013 upon his appointment as Superior Administrator of the Abbey.[2] On 16 April 2015, Father Erik Varden became the eleventh Abbot of Mount St Bernard Abbey, following a further election,[4] also becoming the first abbot to have been born outside Britain or Ireland to lead this abbey. He also is an author of books and articles in the field of Christian spirituality and monasticism.[1] He is also a musician and studied Gregorian Chant under Dr. Mary Berry, later co-founding the Chant Forum with Dame Margaret Truran of Stanbrook Abbey.

In 2015, Abbot Varden was interviewed as part of a BBC Four documentary, Saints and Sinners: Britain's Millennium of Monasteries, by Dr. Janina Ramirez.[5]

On 1 October 2019, he was appointed by Pope Francis as the Prelate of the Territorial Prelature of Trondheim in his native Norway, which had been vacant for the previous ten years.[3] The consecration of Fr. Varden was scheduled for 4 January 2020 but was postponed because of Fr Varden's health reasons.[6]

He received episcopal ordination on 3 October 2020 in Nidaros Cathedral.[7] He is the first native Norwegian bishop of Trondheim in modern times: his five predecessors were all German.[8][9]

• Varden, Erik, Fr (2018). The Shattering of Loneliness : On Christian Remembrance. London. ISBN 9781472953261.
• Varden, Erik (2011). Redeeming freedom : the principle of servitude in Bérulle. Roma: Pontificio Ateneo S. Anselmo. ISBN 9783830674788.
• Varden, Erik (2021). Homesick for Glory: A Trappist About the Abundance of Life. Verlag Herder. ISBN 9783451820205.

• The Catholic Church in Norway Official Site
• Bishop Varden at Catholic-Hierarchy
• The Episcopal Ordination of Erik Varden