Filipino priest elected abbot of South Carolina’s Mepkin Abbey

January 21, 2026 – 11:16 AM

Dom Gerard Jonas Palmares, the new abbot of Our Lady of Mepkin Abbey in South Carolina. (OCSO)

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A Filipino priest has been elected the new leader of Mepkin Abbey, a community of Catholic monks in the United States.

Dom Gerard Jonas Palmare will serve a six-year term as abbot of Our Lady of Mepkin Abbey in Moncks Corner, a town in South Carolina.

Before joining the monastic community, Palmares was a member of the presbyterium of the Archdiocese of Lipa.

Born in Lipa City, he was ordained a priest by Cardinal Ricardo Vidal on Nov. 20 1991. From 1998 to 2009, he served as secretary to the archbishop and chancellor of the archdiocese.

Palmare, 61, entered Mepkin Abbey in 2010 and made his solemn profession on Dec. 3, 2016.

Archbishop Gilbert Garcera of Lipa called on the faithful to pray for Palmare as he begins his new ministry.

“I ask all the faithful of our archdiocese to remember him in their prayers, that the Lord may grant him the grace needed to shepherd his community faithfully, to deepen the monastery’s witness of contemplative life, and to serve the wider Church with generosity and peace,” Garcera said.

Mepkin Abbey was established in 1949 on the site of the historic Mepkin Plantation along the Cooper River north of Charleston.

Founded by monks from the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky, the community belongs to the Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance, commonly known as Trappists.