About us

A Fellowship of the Quest

The Knights of the Holy Grail is a fellowship of the Quest formed in the chivalric tradition of the West. 

The fellowship is organized around the legend of the Holy Grail, which symbolically expresses the search for ancient Christian wisdom, spiritual perfection and the hidden treasures of Christ's holy Church.

The chivalric tradition forms a major and recurring theme in the 2,000 year-old spirituality and traditions of the Church. 

The Lord Jesus Christ, as well as St. Paul and others, often spoke in terms of the spiritual warfare and the Grail knight sees himself as being engaged in a war of cosmic proportions pitting angels and the forces of heaven against demons and the powers of darkness.

This tradition is sadly neglected today, often only to be replaced by a thin veneer of chivalry in name only by those who seek mere worldly or vainglory rather than the glory of God.

The Holy Grail

A mystery from the first has enshrouded the Legend of the Holy Grail.  That the Grail was symbolic and intended to typify the Sacrament of the Holy Communion is abundantly clear from a thousand passages in the various versions of the story.  All beyond this primary indication is indefinite, shadowy, impalpable.

Yet we feel as we read that the words employed are intended to convey some deeper meaning than bears on the face of it.  The romance is more than a romance.  It is also a secret written in cipher.  Its mysticism is as marked as its mystery.

Throughout, there is a continual suggestion of hidden meanings, a recurrent insistence on things seen as types and symbols of things unseen.  When Mallory tells us that 'the history of the Sancgreal is chronicled for one of the truest and the holiest that is in this world,' or an earlier poet that it was written by the hand of Our Lord Himself, it is clear that they meant to draw a clear line of demarcation between this story and the older secular romances of Arthur and his knights.

But wherein lies the difference between them?  What is the key of the cipher?  What is the Presence that haunts and hints at every turn in the path that lies through the hallowed ground?

The Quest

The central service and mystery of Christianity is the Communion of the Holy Eucharist, and its center is the Holy Cup.  Around this Cup, or Grail, is organized the Knights of the Holy Grail.

The sacrament of the Holy Supper is taught throughout, and is held up as the most sacred service of the Knights.

Jesus taught in parables, which were not always meant to be taken just literally but which also conveyed higher symbolic truths.  Central to the work of the Knights is the Quest of the Holy Grail—the deeper meaning of the parable and the sacrament.  To all who seek the Grail is granted the keeping of something most precious—the indwelling Christ in our hearts.

The quest of the Holy Grail is to seek mystical union with Christ, to strive for Christian perfection, and to practice an ecstatic religion which keeps one unspotted from the world (John 4:23-24).

It proclaims the gospel of faith—faith in God and love and immortality through Christ, and bids us to find it.

The mystic and the heroic mold alike after an exalted pattern.  The valiant mission of the Knights, realized in the Quest, is strengthened by the principles and teachings of the brotherhood, which aim to instruct the full-orbed man,—body, mind, and soul.

(1) The body, its cleanness, health, and purity, that it is the temple of the Holy Ghost.  (2) The mind, the wealth of spiritual knowledge, and the strategy of being prepared for success in winning the valiant struggle of life for the noble, knightly crown.  (3) The soul, its companionship with Christ.

The true Knight will put the principles of the Holy Grail, like the motto Excelsior, above his head, and be drawn upward by their irresistible pull for attainment and achievement.

True spiritual knighthood may neither be bought nor given by another; it can be obtained only by those who demonstrate by their lives and actions the true spirit of knighthood.

The Kingdom of Heaven

The Holy Grail is a very personal quest to find the kingdom of heaven within, the treasured desire of the heart.  "For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."

In the fellowship of the Knights of the Holy Grail, we share a deep spiritual and mystical sense of community.  We gather often to pray, study ancient Christian teachings, practice contemplation, and share communal meals.

We feed our souls on the body and blood of Christ and strive to enter more deeply into the mysteries of Christ's holy Church.

While not taking the religious vows of fighting monks like the Knights of St. John or the legendary Knights Templar, the life of a Knight of the Holy Grail is no less demanding.

Our aim is to cultivate the interior life, the "kingdom of heaven within," while we work for our daily bread.  Members of the brotherhood remain in the outside world and continue the activities of daily life while observing an inner life of prayer and communion.

Even while living and working in the world, it is possible for us to share in the mystical life, whereby we may become "partakers of the divine nature" (2 Peter 1:4).

Herein are hidden many mysteries, which the Eastern Church calls deification or divinization, a spiritual process of restoration to the original man or woman of Paradise, created in the Image and Likeness of God.

Knights and Ladies often choose to live close to ancient churches, shrines, monasteries or cemeteries, separating themselves as much as possible from earthly distractions while concentrating their hearts and minds on the holy mysteries.