Norbert was a friend of Bernard of Clairvaux and was largely influenced by the Cistercian ideals as to both the manner of life and the government of his order.

As the Premonstratensians are not monks but canons regular, their work often involves preaching and the exercising of pastoral ministry; they frequently serve in parishes close to their abbeys or priories.

[4] In 1126, when the order received papal approbation by Pope Honorius II, there were nine houses; others were established in quick succession throughout western Europe, so that at the middle of the fourteenth century there were some 1,300 monasteries for men and 400 for women.

Like most orders they were almost completely devastated by the successive onslaughts of the Reformation, French Revolution, and Napoleon, but then experienced a revival in the 19th century.

In 1893, Father Bernard Pennings and two other Norbertines from Berne Abbey arrived in the United States of America to minister to Belgian immigrants in northern Wisconsin.

Unusually,[citation needed] within the religious communities of the Catholic Church, the Norbertine Order has always seen the spiritual life of the canonesses as being on an equal footing with that of its priests and lay brothers.

In the Middle Ages, the Premonstratensians even had a few double monasteries,[11] where men and women lived in cloisters located next to each other as part of the same abbey, the communities demonstrating their unity by sharing the church building.

Another unique practice of the Premonstratensian Rite was the celebration of a daily votive Mass in honor of the Virgin Mary in each of its abbeys and priories.

[citation needed] As of 2012, there were Premonstratensian abbeys or priories throughout the world: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Peru, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and the USA.

12/13) Bronislava of Poland (or of Zwierzniec) (+1259, f. Aug. 30), Gerlach of Valkenburg (+1172, Jan. 5), Gertrude of Aldenberg (Altenburg), Abbess (+1297, f. Aug. 13), Hugh of Fosse (+1164, f. Feb. 10), Hroznata of Teplá (+1217, f. Jul.

Schools founded or sponsored by the order include: Northern Ireland's Historical Abuse Inquiry investigated reports that Brendan Smyth, a member of the Norbertine Order, was allowed to continue paedophilia for more than four decades, even after Smyth himself had admitted in 1994, the same year that he was jailed for his crimes, that "Over the years of religious life it could be that I have sexually abused between 50 and 100 children.