SIXTEEN YEARS AGO, Michael-John Austin approached his parish priest in Chicago about the possibility of founding a new type of religious community in the Episcopal Church.

"He said he thought I could do it - an then added that I was out of my mind," Abbot Michael-John, as he is now known, remembers with a smile.

The Companions of St. Luke, he says, has become one of the fastest-growing religious communities in the United States. From its beginning in Chicago to its current location in southeast Iowa, it draws on ancient traditions of Benedictine spirituality interpreted in innovative ways.

Surrounded by rolling woodlands and bucolic farms, the abbey that is home to the community doesn’t fit the traditional image of a monastery. Instead of a stately chapel with stained glass, the community worships in a former pole barn. Just six of its members live here permanently, while another 29 are scattered around the country. The community includes both sexes, some married and some single.

And yet the abbey’s ties to ancient traditions remain deep and strong. Day after day, month after month and year after year, the brothers and sisters keep the monastic hours, gathering for services in the chapel four times each day. Their guiding document is the Rule of St. Benedict, written in the sixth century as a guide to drawing souls closer to God.

"Our charism is to make monastic life available to everyone: single, married, with children or without," says Abbot Michael-John, 57.

The community is one of three Episcopal Benedictine orders in the United States. It combines characteristics of an order (typically made up of vowed, celibate members), and a community (which can include married people and usually has no motherhouse). Its members range in age from 35 to the late 70’s. Many work in the health field, in part because of the community’s connection to St. Luke, the patron of physicians.

After eight years in Chicago, the community relocated to Iowa in 2000 at the invitation of the Rt. Rev. Christopher Epting, then bishop of Iowa, who long had hoped to have a religious community in his diocese. At that time, the group numbered four. Abbot Michael-John found a 35-acre, overgrown property near Fort Madison and convinced its skeptical owner to sell it on a contract to the group.

"We had no down payment and could only pay half of what the owner was asking for in monthly payments," he recalls. "But when I began talking to him about the Benedictine traditions of stewardship of the land, he was willing to take a chance on us, as unusual as we seemed to him."

The years since have been full of hard work. Community members have cleared brush, renovated buildings and created an oasis of peace in the middle of the woods. Besides old-fashioned elbow grease, the community has used digital technology. Its website has attracted the curious from around the United States.

The abbey has differing levels of commitment among its members, including associates, oblates and vowed religious. Brothers and sisters who live elsewhere stay in touch through frequent e-mail contact and periodic gatherings and keep the monastic daily services as they can. All participate in a rigorous formation process and are asked to donate five percent of their earnings to support the community.

Besides prayer, study and labor (on-site members work at the abbey or in the local community), the community embraces the traditional monastic vocation of hospitality. Visitors of all backgrounds and faiths are welcome to stay in its new guest cabins, constructed this past simmer thanks to $300,000 in gifts.

Amid singing birds, gentle breezes and tolling bells, guests join the community members as they follow their time-honored rituals of prayer.

"Whenever the church finds itself in trouble- as I think it is in this age of secularism - then God provides new expressions of spirituality," says Abbot Michael-John. "People will say to us that there’s something that draws them here, even it they don’t understand why."