The Little Portion Hermitage and Monastery is the Motherhouse of the Brothers and Sisters of Charity, a Public Association of the Faithful in the Diocese of Little Rock, AR.
Founded in 1981 by John Michael Talbot, a pioneer in the Christian music industry who was given a vision for a new expression of monastic life to serve the Catholic Church in America. Inspired initially by the hermit lifestyle and evangelical impact of St. Francis of Assisi, John Michael set out to realize that vision for an integrated monastic community in the Ozark Mountains of Northwest Arkansas.
Little Portion is the English translation of the Italian word, portiuncula. It comes to our community from the life of St. Francis who heard the voice of the Lord telling him to "rebuild my church." Francis understood that instruction quite literally at first, and restored the dilapidated chapel near Assisi.
Today, nestled in the Ozark Mountains, John Michael's vision has come to fruition. In collaboration with Faye Jones, a student of the renowned American architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, and his student Albert Skiles and his wife Lisa, Little Portion is an oasis of peace and solitude, ready to welcome wearied travelers on the pathways of life. Residential members of the integrated monastic community live a life of work and prayer, solitude and community, modeled after the counsels of the great saints of Christian monastic history.