Envision a website dedicated to attracting young women to life as a nun. I look to the Nashville or Ann Arbor Dominicans as examples of flourishing and vibrant young communities leading the way. So when I visited the Catholic Nuns Today website that is what I thought I would find. I was wrong.
What I found is … this.
And that is the best part. The rest of the website is a bad acid trip down irrelevant lane. Take this pitch for instance. “Come be a nun, don’t worry it won’t get in the way of your day job.” Think I exaggerate?
Does being a Sister limit your career opportunities?
Not at all. And, our life is much more than a career. Our professional gifts are focused in service of God and of others. We use our gifts as physicians, teachers, missionaries, spiritual directors, social workers, psychologists, advocates for social justice, lawyers, counselors, ecologists, musicians, writers and artists to fulfill our vocation and our call.
Now meet Sister Linda Gibler, OP, of the Dominican Sisters of Houston. Sister is a former waitress who felt something was missing. Thank goodness she found it.
When I came to the Dominicans, I already had my BA in Sociology. I later received a Master’s in Pastoral Studies. My first jobs as a Sister were as a chaplain in a county hospital and in parish ministry. Later, when I saw the first of the pictures from the Hubble telescope, the beauty of the Universe overwhelmed me and I wanted to learn more about the relationships between philosophy, science, and religion. I went on to receive another Master’s in Philosophy & Religion. As I was studying, I investigated the “cosmocentric” aspects of Roman Catholic celebrations especially the use of water, olive oil, and fire in the sacraments. My Dominican congregation was extremely supportive of me and very encouraging throughout my eight years of discovery. I have just obtained my Doctorate in Philosophy & Religion with a concentration in Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness.
Now you might have noticed that none of the nuns look like, well, nuns. That, they think, is a selling point.
Where have all the habits gone?
For many years, Sisters wore the long habits which were fashioned after the common dress of pious women in Medieval times. Even those Congregations founded in more modern times adopted similar styles of dress. The styles were handed down for generations, with only a few modifications, until the renewal of religious life following Vatican Council II in 1965. Since then Sisters have had the option of retaining the traditional habit or changing to a simple, modest contemporary style of dress. Some Sisters still prefer the traditional habit. You may recognize a Sister who does not wear a traditional habit by some small sign, a cross or pin, that is a distinctive emblem of her Congregation.
Were I doing this piece as parody, I bet some people would write in the combox that I overdid it. The future lies in growing traditional communities. Cosmocentric T-shirt Communities of 1972 like the Dominicans of Houston are the past; they just don’t seem to know it. I suppose the dinosaurs on the verge of extinction didn’t know their number was up either. Catholic Nuns Today? I don’t think so.
April 16, 2009 at 1:15 am
Is this the audition for the Indigo Girls tribute band?
May 26, 2009 at 5:50 pm
“One of the major barriers to women’s vocations is that many traditional Catholic women also have successful and intellectually challenging professional lives and don’t want to give that up”
I would be willing to bet that the person who said this is an American.
June 13, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Catholic nuns today are a joke. No wonder the convents are empty–what's the point of being a nun when being a nun is just like not being a nun? Today's nuns have gym memberships and have jobs. At least Catholic monks have not ditched religious habits, but the women are a disgrace. These Novus Ordo nuns have "Protestantized" Catholicism. Traditional (habit) convents are flourishing, however. Eastern Orthodox nuns still wear traditional habits, but Roman nuns have all become "Protestant," proof that the Roman Church may not be the true Church after all.
June 13, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Roman Catholic nuns today are a total joke. They look like lesbian feminists with their stupid short hair, droopy earrings, and miniature (microscopic) cross pins. Combine that with liturgical dancing and you have a real farce. Yes, the Catholic Church isn't what it used to be. Catholic nuns are indeed the worst.
June 13, 2009 at 5:18 pm
Even Muslim "laywomen" wear full religious garb but a Catholic nun is now ashamed of wearing a religious habit! Think of the damage Catholic women would do the priesthood if they were allowed to be ordained! They would substitute communion hosts with cookies or large pita bread slices. Things would go downhill from there!
June 29, 2009 at 2:37 pm
" But if the consecrated person becomes indistinguishable because of her secular attire, then the symbolism is obscured if not lost. …… if the Moslem women can wear veils, why not the "brides of the Lord"?
What kind of habit did Jesus wear?
Honestly, Jesus told the APOSTLES (and you can't get much more consecrated or set aside than the Apostles) to "Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? (Matthew 6:25)", and He castigated the Pharisees for their style of dress, which was designed to announce to the world how pious and holy they were ("But all their works they do for to be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments"(Matthew 23:5)
WE are not supposed to emulate the Pharisees or the Moslems, or try to "do them one better".
We are Christians, and we should be doing the OPPOSITE of what the ungodly do, who dress the outside to appear religious.
Jesus said to forget about the outside, and work on making our insides more like Him.
I think that part of the attraction of the habit-wearing orders to younger women is the appeal to CARNAL religiousity and the desire to be part of a group — to an immature young girl, the habit is a visible thing that a person can put on, and voila, the wearer becomes a nun simply by donning a costume, in much the same way as the Pharisees and modernday Moslems displayed their religion to the world in their outward attire.
And finally, Jesus said, "(Matthew 7:16) Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?"
Judging by the snarky tone of this posting and the sarcasm and name calling in many of the comments here, I'd have to call even the most heretical and feminist nuns Godly in comparison.
Ain't no figs in this thistle patch, nosirree…
May 7, 2010 at 4:18 am
These feminist pant suit Big Hair prototype lesbian nuns have brought the name calling on themselves. They are really Protestants. Thank God these Newchurch Novus Ordo secular religious orders are fading away, while traditionalist convents are flourishing!
May 7, 2010 at 4:25 am
"You shall know them by their fruits…" Yes, Vatican II = liturgical abuse, clown masses, the destruction of church interiors, eradication of high altars, vanishing belief in the Real Presence, the clergy sex abuse crises, tacky secular Catholic hymns, and so called Newchurch Novus Ordo nuns in stretch pant suits and Big Hair. These pretend nuns are all about social justice–Jesus did not establish a Church on earth as a vehicle for social justice. These nuns are dying out, thank God. Their secular religious orders are fading away. Traditionalist convents are flourishing!
May 7, 2010 at 4:26 am
Catholic nuns today are a joke. No wonder the convents are empty–what's the point of being a nun when being a nun is just like not being a nun? Today's nuns have gym memberships and have jobs. At least Catholic monks have not ditched religious habits, but the women are a disgrace. These Novus Ordo nuns have "Protestantized" Catholicism. Traditional (habit) convents are flourishing, however. Eastern Orthodox nuns still wear traditional habits, but Roman nuns have all become "Protestant," proof that the Roman Church may not be the true Church after all.
May 7, 2010 at 4:27 am
Catholic nuns today are a joke. No wonder the convents are empty–what's the point of being a nun when being a nun is just like not being a nun? Today's nuns have gym memberships and have jobs. At least Catholic monks have not ditched religious habits, but the women are a disgrace. These Novus Ordo nuns have "Protestantized" Catholicism. Traditional (habit) convents are flourishing, however. Eastern Orthodox nuns still wear traditional habits, but Roman nuns have all become "Protestant," proof that the Roman Church may not be the true Church after all.
May 7, 2010 at 4:31 am
You may also recognize us in virtue of the fact that 99% of us resemble the stereotypical image of the modern American "bull dyke"…"
Seriously, I hate to point out the obvious or to use so crass a term, but the shoe seems to fit so well…the short cropped, style-less hair, the lump-shaped body, the frumpy clothes. Is there an intentional connection?
June 18, 2010 at 4:50 am
I was taught by two orders in the 50s and 60s — Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary (BVMs) and Religious of the Divine Compassion (RDCs). Both wore the traditional full habit. I always felt that the full habit evoked more respect. I can understand modifications being necessary so that nuns and sisters are more comfortable and better able to fulfill their apostolates in today's world but I wonder if the sharp decline in Catholic schools is in some ways linked to the extremely secular dress styles adopted by so many orders (as with the two aforementioned ones that taught me) after Vatican II. Unless you can easily spot that little lapel cross or pin you might not even know you were in the presence of a religious. In my opinion, a more recognizable religious habit needs to re-adopted.