Bonne-Espérance Abbey

Bonne-Espérance Abbey (French: Abbaye de Bonne-Espérance, pronounced [abei də bɔn ɛspeʁɑ̃s]) was a Premonstratensian abbey that existed from 1130 to the end of the 18th century, located in Vellereille-les-Brayeux in the Walloon municipality of Estinnes, province of Hainaut, Diocese of Tournai, in present-day Belgium.

A legend says that when Odo saw the place that became the site of the new abbey, he exclaimed: "Bonæ spei fecisti filios tuos" ("O God, Thou hast made Thy children to be of good hope").

In the time of the forty-sixth and last abbot of Bonne-Espérance, Bonaventure Daublain, the abbey was twice occupied and pillaged by the French Revolutionary Army, in 1792 and again in 1794, when the community was dispersed.

In 1616 or 1617 the remains of Saint Frederick of Hallum were brought here from the Premonstratensian Mariengaarde Abbey [nl] in the Netherlands to save them from the Calvinists.

At the time of the suppression the statue of Our Lady of Good Hope was hidden; and when peace was restored, it was brought to the church of Vellereille of which one of the canons of Bonne-Espérance was the parish priest.