For almost a century thousands of pilgrims have sought peace, comfort and refuge in the quiet of Mount St Benedict, situated in the Northern Range above St Augustine. Central to that peace is the church overlooking the Caroni plains, and the abbey monks of the Benedictine Order. For the past ten years or more the two abbey clocks installed by Br Gabriel in 1950 when the present church was built, have been silent.

Installation in progress. Photo: Anthony Aqui

The last clock “fixer” at the Mount was the Dutch priest Fr Benedict Simons who provided “intensive care” to the old clocks as best he could; but Fr Benedict died in January 2009 and the abbey could find no one to restore its clocks . . . until a retired businessman with a yen for clocks, frustrated by the many non-functioning public clocks, decided it was time for correct timekeeping.

For the 100^th anniversary of the abbey’s foundation on October 6, 2012, the abbey commissioned timekeeper Michael Williams to restore its clocks; by coincidence the faithful got their new clocks on October 6 - on the abbey’s 99^th anniversary.

Except in a power failure - the new clocks should always tell the correct time – but when power returns, the clocks will reset themselves to the correct time automatically; and to the delight of evening worshippers, the newly restored church clock will now show the time when the sun goes down – because a “halo” of LED lights has been added by the “Timekeeper”.