I feel there is great value in monasticism. I'm a Buddhist so it's still quite a thing there so maybe that's why.
But focusing on Christianity... most monastics seem to be in the RC church, though there are Protestant monastics too.
The West has a strong tradition of monasticism dating back to the lights of the Desert Fathers brought from Egypt by the likes of St. John Cassian (who was from what is now Romania, but died in 435 AD in France), most famously nourished by St. Benedict of Nursia (d. 547) a little while later. But it is important to note that Christian monasticism originally began not in the Western Roman Empire, but in the East in
Egypt, with our father St. Anthony who began his life as a hermit in the Egyptian desert at around the age of 20 (c. 270 AD) after the death of his parents. There were others before him such as St. Paul of Thebes (who began his own life of solitude c. 250 AD), but St. Anthony was the first to gain a following, and is often credited as "the father of Christian monasticism". Other important early Christian monks of Egypt include St. Pachomius (292-348), who founded cenobitic monasticism (where monks live in a communal arrangement, rather than alone in caves or in the open desert), St. Macarius (founder of the monastery that bears his name in Wadi El Natrun, c. 360), St. Pigol (who founded the White Monastery in Sohag, Egypt c. 442), and St. Shenouda the Archimandrite (nephew of St. Pigol, under whom the White Monastery reached its zenith). There are many more than these, and together the holy monks of Egypt, with their brothers in Syria, Palestine, and Mesopotamia who founded many other monasteries, are known as the "Desert Fathers". Some Christian traditions restrict this time period to a specific time ("The Age of the Desert Fathers" or whatever), such as 3rd to 6th century, but the Coptic Orthodox Church -- which is the traditional/national Church of Egypt and hence considers itself the rightful guard of this tradition -- does not do so; there are modern Desert Fathers, such as Abba ("Father") Matta El Meskeen (1919-2006) of the Monastery of St. Macarius, or Abba Lazarus El Antoni (currently living). There are also Desert Mothers, the female equivalents of Desert Fathers, both ancient (e.g., Amma Sarah, Amma Syncletica, etc.) and modern (Mother Irini of the Convent of St. Philopateer Mercurius in Old Cairo, 1936-2006).
*Do people here feel that living in this sort of community is still a valid path for those who feel suited to it?
Of course.
*Would you consider spending some or even all of your life in this sort of community?
I spent about two weeks at the Monastery of St. Shenouda the Archimandrite in upstate New York USA about six years ago as part of some academic research I was doing at the time to get my master's degree. I did really enjoy it, but I can't really honestly say I felt the call to dedicate my life to it. I have too many health and other personal problems to really be an asset to a monastery, I think. But that's okay. Our father, the departed Pope Shenouda III (r. 1971-2012) of thrice-blessed memory, once said that the ideal in our Church is "Every home a monastery, and every believer a monk", and we really do hold to that (as a Church; me
personally less so, though I am trying more lately with the Holy Week upon us), for instance by praying the daily prayers every day from the prayer book called the Agpeya, which shapes our day around the seven daily prayers that were first established in the Egyptian monasteries many, many centuries ago. ("Agpeya" is a Coptic word...well, Copto-Arabic, from Coptic ϯⲁϫⲡ
ti-agp "hour".)
Following this, we are encouraged to visit monasteries as regularly as we are able, and under normal circumstances (i.e., if there was no pandemic going on right now), there would be regular diocese-level activities organized around trips to monasteries and retreat centers around the world, so that we can stay connected to the life of the monks, which really is for us synonymous with the life of the Church itself. The monasteries are our heart, and the monks the circulating blood, you could say.
