CARA Reports on Religious Life - Confirms Traditional Religious Life Attracting Vocations

From the Archdiocese of Washington website

By Msgr. Charles Pope

On February 2 the National Conference of Catholic Bishops released a report on Religious life. The study was conducted by the very reputable Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA).

The Bishops’ report is interesting and informative for what it says, but also has puzzling omissions in the topics covered, which seem to amount to ignoring the “elephant in the room.” The “elephant” is the rather obvious fact that religious communities that preserve traditional elements such as the habit, common prayer, communal life, focused apostolates and strong affirmation of Church teaching, are doing well in comparison to orders that do not. Indeed some are doing quite well.

That data regarding the strength of tradition is covered in an earlier 2009 CARA report commissioned by the The National Religious Vocations Conference (NRVC). Strangely the bishop’s report did not seem to want to go near the topic of tradition. Hence I would like to look at some data from both the 2011 report and the 2009.

Let’s start with the 2011 Bishop’s Report. The Full report is HERE. The numbers are from CARA and refer to sisters who made their Solemn Vows in 2010. The comments are just my own.

1.Scope – 311 Superiors responded to the survey and this represents 63% of Religious Congregations in the USA

2.Most lay fallow – It is striking that the report indicates that 84% of Religious Communities had no one profess solemn vows in 2010. 13% had one woman profess solemn vows and only 3% had between 2 and 9 women profess solemn vows. While this is only a picture of one year it shows that a large number of communities are in very serious shape.

3.Missing Data? The report must have excluded some of the more fruitful congregations since I personally know of two communities that had more than 9 women enter.

4.Diversity – 62% of newly professed sisters are Caucasian, 19% are Asian or Pacific Islander, 10% are Hispanic. This suggests a lot of work needs to be done to reach the Hispanic (Latino) Catholic communities in the US which are very underrepresented in the numbers entering.

5.Older sisters less diverse – An astonishing 94% of sisters overall are Caucasian but this number is sure to drop a bit as the numbers in point four begin to shift forward in the years ahead.

6.Converts – 13% of newly professed sister in 2010 were converts.

7.Big Families Factor – A remarkable 64% came from families of 5 or more children. See pie chart at upper right. This confirms the long held notion that decreased family size is a significant factor in the decline of religious vocations.

8.School Connections – 51% of new professed sisters attended Catholic elementary school. For decades Catholic Schools had been an engine of vocations for sisters. That seems a wash today and is likely due to the fact that most schools have few if nay Sisters teaching.

9.Parish connections – 2/3 of the Sisters had participated in parish youth ministry programs and/or young adult ministry or Newman clubs.

10.Liturgical Connections – 57% had been involved in some sort of liturgical ministry.

11.Devotional Connection – 74% of the New Sisters had participated in Parish retreats, 65% prayed the rosary frequently, 64% participated regularly in Eucharistic Adoration. 57% had taken part in regular Bible Study programs. Hence parish life and traditional pious factors play and important role as does more more modern forms such as liturgical ministry and Bible Study.
12.Encouragements – 52% of new sisters report being encourged to enter religious life by another sister, 44% by a friend 39% by a parish priest.
13.Only 26% say their mother encouraged them on only 16% say their father encouraged them.
14.Discouragements! – An astonishing 51% say their parents or family members actively discouraged them from entering! This is quite an awful statistic actually. The very ones who should encourage are off message.
OK a lot of good information. But in the end the report seems to dodge the question as to why 84% of Religious Congregations had no one profess vows. I do not blame CARA for this since they likely received the scope of the survey from their patrons at the USCCB. The question remains though, why do some congregations show success and others not? What are the factors that most influence women to enter certain orders and not others?

Fortunately another CARA study mentioned above was commissioned by NRVC in 2009 and it does explore such questions. The full report is HERE and the findings are these:

1.Scope – The response rate in this survey was higher, about 80% of Religious in the US had their community respond to the survey. Most of the communities that did not respond were small larelgly contemplative communities.

2.The Survey includes both men and women.

3.How many in Formation – Three-fourths of institutes of men (78 percent) and two-thirds of institutes of women (66 percent) have at least one person currently in initial formation (candidate or postulant, novice, or temporary professed). However, almost half of the institutes that have someone in initial formation have no more than one or two. About 20% of the responding institutes currently have more than five people in initial formation.

4.Aging – Over all religious are an aging population. 75% of Men are over 60 and an astonishing 91% of women are over 60.

5.More diverse – Compared to men and women religious in the last century, those coming to religious life today are much more diverse in terms of their age, racial and ethnic background, and life experience. 21% are Hispanic/Latino, 14% are Asian/Pacific Islander, and 6% are African/African American. About 58% are Caucasian/white, compared to about 94% of older professed members. This show a significantly higher percentage of Latinos than the smaller 2010 survey above.

6.Critical Factors – Younger respondents are more likely than older respondents to say they were attracted to religious life by a desire to be more committed to the Church and to their particular institute by its fidelity to the Church. Many also report that their decision to enter their institute was influenced by its practice regarding a religious habit. Significant generational gaps, especially between the Millennial Generation (born in 1982 or later) and the Vatican II Generation (born between 1943 and 1960), are evident throughout the study on questions involving the Church and the habit. Differences between the two generations also extend to questions about community life as well as styles and types of prayer. Ah, so here is the elephant that the 2011 report chose to leave unexplored. The italics in this sixth point are a direct quote from the CARA report and it makes it clear that data confirms what we already know anecdotally. Tradition and the respect for it is an important factor for younger vocations, as is fidelity to the Church.

7.Generation Gap – Millennial Generation respondents are much more likely than other respondents – especially those from the Vatican II Generation – to say that daily Eucharist, Liturgy of the Hours, Eucharistic Adoration, and other devotional prayers are “very” important to them. Pay attention Religious orders.

8.Communal life – When asked about their decision to enter their particular religious institute, new members cite the community life in the institute as the most influential factor in their decision (followed closely by the prayer life or prayer styles in the community). Most new members indicate that they want to live, work, and pray with other members of their religious institute, with the last being especially important to them. Responses to an open-ended question about what most attracted them to their religious institute reinforce the importance new members place on this aspect of religious life. When asked about various living arrangements, most new members prefer to live in a large (eight or more) or medium-sized (four to seven) community and to live only with other members of their institute. Younger respondents express even stronger preferences for living with members of their institute in large community settings. Findings from the survey of religious institutes suggest that that new membership is negatively correlated with the number of members living alone. That is, the higher the number of members who live alone, the less likely an institute is to have new members. Imagine wanting to live in community when you enter religious life. Here too we see that tradition is confirmed and the loose knit apartment style, dispersed living of many dying congregations is simply being rejected by younger people seeking religious life and to live, work and pray in community

9.The Habit – The responses to the open-ended question about what attracted them to their religious institute reveal that having a religious habit was an important factor for a significant number of new members.
Thus, the data of this earlier CARA report confirms what most Catholics already know: those who have vocations to religious life have a strong preference for the practices of tradition. A strong and enthusiastic love of Christ and his Church, fidelity to his teachings expressed through the magisterium, the wearing of the religious habit, vigorous common life and common prayer, a focused apostolate, joyful and faithful members of the community, all these are essential in attracting new vocations. Of course.

Death wish? This has been clear for some time now and why some religious communities do see the obvious and adapt is mystifying to say the least. The clear message of the Holy Spirit who inspires vocations, the clear admonition of Rome which has strongly requested the return to the habit and other reforms, and the obvious preference of the young people who vote with their feet, is a clarion call. Communities that follow these simple truths are growing, some are growing rapidly. Communities that refuse to follow these simple truths would appear to have a death wish.

Picture – My own parish convent is occupied by an order that does follow these truths and they are bursting at the seams. They have just out-grown our convent which housed over 25 of them. They have now moved to another larger convent and left four sisters behind here. I have no doubt that our convent will fill again soon for the Servant Sisters of the Lord are a growing order who obey well the Holy Spirit and thus attract many many vocations. Their picture solemn vows is posted above. God is faithful, he is also clear as to what it takes for a religious community to thrive.

"Rays of Musical Light: Cloistered Nuns Share Record Label With Elton John"

From Catholic Online
By Sonja Corbitt

NASHVILLE, TN (Catholic Online) - "The whole world, compacted as it were together, was represented to [Benedict's] eyes in one ray of light" (The Life of Our Most Holy Father Saint Benedict, Pope Saint Gregory the Great).

It seems the cloistered, self-sufficient community of the Abbey of Our Lady of the Annunciation near Avignon, France, also sees the world through a Benedictine ray of light, and is about to diffuse a radiant love all over the world through the slow, soaring movements of their Gregorian chant.

Benedictine vows include Stability, Fidelity to the Monastic Life, and Obedience, and their communal life is centered around the eight canonical hours of the Divine Office. The Benedictine Divine Office is one of the most ancient daily observances of any kind anywhere in the world, and Gregorian chant is the oldest music ever written down.

Originating in the ancient Jewish prayer tradition, Benedictines continued the practice of daily singing of the psalms (meaning, songs) and have conducted the Divine Office for the 1500 years since St. Benedict first wrote and compiled his Rule. The Benedictine sisters at the Abbey of Our Lady of the Annunciation, following the Liturgy of the Hours, sing eight times a day.

Ora et Labora, Pray and Work

The mystery and poetry of Scripture at its earthly best, Benedictine prayer rolls on, as daily as parenting, washing dishes, and marriage. Its chant is a living, lived-in song, a relationship with God and Church revealed and expressed in ordinary, but sacred, words and music. It is benediction.

It is this blessing, this work of prayer at the Abbey of Our Lady of the Annunciation, France that attracted the attention of a talent scout for Decca Records. "When you hear them chanting, it's like an immediate escape from the stresses, noise and pace of modern living," he said of the prayer of Benedictine nuns cloistered there.

Decca Records is part of Universal Music, a British label which also produces albums by The Rolling Stones, Lady Gaga, Eminem, Amy Winehouse, U2 and Elton John. After chant first gained secular popularity through Enigma's chart successes in the 1990s, and the last Gregorian chant album released sold over a million albums, Decca Records went on a worldwide search for the finest female Gregorian chanters.

Their anxious ears finally came to rest on the lilting prayer of the Benedictine sisters in Avignon who were chosen over more than 70 other convents worldwide. Typically, prospective pop stars cannot garner enough publicity, but this group is slightly different.

Hidden Life

"We never sought this, it came looking for us," said the abbey's Reverend Mother in a statement released by Universal Music, and indeed, their seclusion posed some challenges for both the record label and the religious community.

"Before starting the recording we were a bit nervous," said English speaking Sister Raphael in an interview. She expressed the whole community's concern for the extraordinary project:

"We were a bit afraid of what was going to happen to our cloistered life, so we confided this to St. Joseph in our prayer: that if this was going to help people to pray, if it was going to help people find God, if it's going to help people find peace, [he should] make this go through."

And "go through" it did, presumably under his patronage and special protection. In accordance with St. Joseph's lifelong, heroic protection of the consecrated, Decca took exceptional measures to protect the isolation the nuns vow until death.

The album contract was passed to the sisters for their signature through the beautiful wood-worked partition that secludes them from the outside world, and recording engineers were only allowed into the convent when the nuns were in different parts of the abbey.

After setting up microphones in the chapel, they retreated to a separate room when the sisters sang, remotely directing the recording. To promote the album, the sisters filmed their own television commercial and photographed the album cover.

"We had to give the cameras to the nuns, because they had access to the more beautiful parts of the monastery," a Decca spokesperson remembered fondly, "so we had to actually hand everything over to them. And they were making their own TV advert, they were making their own CD cover, and it was a very interesting and different way of working."

A Ray of Musical Light

They have no access to newspapers, TV or radio, but the sisters are now on Facebook and YouTube, and their album, Voice: Chant from Avignon, will be released early this November. Remarkably, although the nuns never leave the convent, the whole world will feel the radiant peace of their singing.

"I think that our music appeals to a wider audience, secular and non-secular. The words have a very profound meaning that is coming from the Sacred Scripture. The singing in our daily lives is very important for us. It is our prayer," said Sister Raphael, conveying the heart of her community. It has been said that other than the Bible, the Benedictine Rule was the most influential book in the development of western civilization, a light in medieval darkness.

"It's not quite a question of how we feel when we sing, but who we are, and for whom we sing," the sisters confirm. Indeed, the chanted Office is a song of Love, and they consider this song as one way to contemplatively bring sacred, musical, Benedictine light to a dark, frantic, noisy world.

Solemn Profession of the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles, in Kansas City

Kansas Catholic has FANTASTIC pictures of the Solemn Profession of Vows of the

Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles.

Click on Kansas Catholic above to see all of the pictures, and make sure to see all four parts.

Below are just of few of the incredible photos...

Foundations of Religious Life

The Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious has maintained the historical form of religious life, with sisters living in community and wearing the habit. While many religious orders are currently facing marked decline in novitiates and the aging of their members, the communities of the CMSWR are experiencing growth on a worldwide scale.In this collection of foundational articles, the CMSWR articulates how its perspective is in keeping with the vision set forth by Vatican II, suggesting that its commitment to a more visibly countercultural life and ministry is what sustains its orders and attracts young women to the CMSWR communities. The Foundations of Religious Life is ideal reading for sisters and those in formation, as well as their counterparts in men's communities.

Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles groundbreaking on new convent

Kansas Catholic has a great post about the ground breaking for the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of the Apostles new convent. Too many pictures and captions to copy here. Please take the time to visit and enjoy the post HERE.

New York Times front page article - "U.S. Nuns Facing Vatican Scrutiny"

From the New York Times
By Laurie Goodstein

Photo at left: Mother Mary Clare Millea has been appointed by the Vatican to study the activities of some orders of nuns in the United States. Photo by James Estrin.

The Vatican is quietly conducting two sweeping investigations of American nuns, a development that has startled and dismayed nuns who fear they are the targets of a doctrinal inquisition.

Nuns were the often-unsung workers who helped build the Roman Catholic Church in this country, planting schools and hospitals and keeping parishes humming. But for the last three decades, their numbers have been declining — to 60,000 today from 180,000 in 1965.

While some nuns say they are grateful that the Vatican is finally paying attention to their dwindling communities, many fear that the real motivation is to reel in American nuns who have reinterpreted their calling for the modern world.

In the last four decades since the reforms of the Second Vatican Council, many American nuns stopped wearing religious habits, left convents to live independently and went into new lines of work: academia and other professions, social and political advocacy and grass-roots organizations that serve the poor or promote spirituality. A few nuns have also been active in organizations that advocate changes in the church like ordaining women and married men as priests.

Some sisters surmise that the Vatican and even some American bishops are trying to shift them back into living in convents, wearing habits or at least identifiable religious garb, ordering their schedules around daily prayers and working primarily in Roman Catholic institutions, like schools and hospitals.

“They think of us as an ecclesiastical work force,” said Sister Sandra M. Schneiders (photo at left by Jim Wilson), professor emerita of New Testament and spirituality at the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley, in California. “Whereas we are religious, we’re living the life of total dedication to Christ, and out of that flows a profound concern for the good of all humanity. So our vision of our lives, and their vision of us as a work force, are just not on the same planet.”

The more extensive of the two investigations is called an Apostolic Visitation, and the Vatican has provided only a vague rationale for it: to “look into the quality of the life” of women’s religious institutes. The visitation is being conducted by Mother Mary Clare Millea, an apple-cheeked American with a black habit and smiling eyes, who is the superior general of her order, the Apostles of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and lives in Rome.

In an interview in a formal sitting room at her order’s United States headquarters in Hamden, Conn., Mother Clare said she had already met one-on-one with 127 superiors general of women’s orders, many in that room but also in Chicago, Los Angeles, Rome and St. Louis. She is preparing questionnaires to send to each congregation of women and recruiting teams of investigators, mostly nuns and some priests, who will make visits to congregations that she selects. The visitation focuses only on nuns actively engaged in working in society and the church, not cloistered, contemplative nuns.

Mother Clare’s task is to prepare a confidential report to the Vatican on the state of each of about 340 qualified congregations of nuns in the United States, as well as a summary with her recommendations, all of which she hopes to complete by mid-2011.

The investigation was ordered by Cardinal Franc Rodé, head of the Vatican office that deals with religious orders. In a speech in Massachusetts last year, Cardinal Rodé offered barbed criticism of some American nuns “who have opted for ways that take them outside” the church.

Given this backdrop, Sister Schneiders, the professor in Berkeley, urged her fellow sisters not to cooperate with the visitation, saying the investigators should be treated as “uninvited guests who should be received in the parlor, not given the run of the house.” She wrote this in a private e-mail message to a few friends, but it became public and was widely circulated.

Mother Clare said she was aware that some women’s institutes “weren’t happy” to hear of the visitation, but that so far about 55 percent had responded in person or in writing.

“It’s an opportunity for us to re-evaluate ourselves, to make our reality known and also to be challenged to live authentically who we say we are,” she said.

Each congregation of nuns will be evaluated based on how well they are “living in fidelity” both to their congregation’s own internal norms and constitution, and to the church’s guidelines for religious life, Mother Clare said. For instance, if a congregation’s stated mission is to serve youth, are the nuns doing that? If they do not live in a convent, are they attending Mass and keeping the sacraments? Are their superiors exercising adequate supervision?

“There’s no intention to make us all identical,” she said.

Church historians said that the Vatican usually ordered an apostolic visitation when a particular institution had gone seriously astray. In the wake of the priest sexual-abuse scandal, the Vatican ordered a visitation of American seminaries. It is now conducting a visitation of the Legionaries of Christ, a men’s order whose founder, the Rev. Marcial Maciel Degollado, sexually abused young seminarians, fathered a child and was accused of financial improprieties. He died in 2008.

But the investigation of American nuns surprised many because there was no obvious precipitating cause.

Sister Janice Farnham, a part-time professor of church history at the Boston College School of Theology and Ministry, said, “Why are the U.S. sisters being singled out, when women religious in other countries are struggling with many issues about the quality of their lives, in the Church and in their societies?”

The visitation could result in some communities of nuns’ being ordered to make changes, but judging from how the Vatican handled previous visitations, those consequences may never become public.

The second investigation of nuns is a doctrinal assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, an umbrella organization that claims 1,500 members from about 95 percent of women’s religious orders. This investigation was ordered by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which is headed by an American, Cardinal William Levada.

Cardinal Levada sent a letter to the Leadership Conference saying an investigation was warranted because it appeared that the organization had done little since it was warned eight years ago that it had failed to “promote” the church’s teachings on three issues: the male-only priesthood, homosexuality and the primacy of the Roman Catholic Church as the means to salvation.

The letter goes on to say that, “Given both the tenor and the doctrinal content of various addresses” at assemblies the Leadership Conference has held in recent years, the problem has not been fixed.

The Leadership Conference drew the Vatican’s wrath decades ago when its president welcomed Pope John Paul II to the United States with a plea for the ordination of women. But several nuns who have attended the group’s meetings in recent years said they had not heard anything that would provoke the Vatican’s ire.

Officers of the Leadership Conference refused interview requests, but said in an e-mail message that they had one meeting in late May with the investigators, Bishop Leonard P. Blair, of the Diocese of Toledo, and Msgr. Charles Brown from the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith in the Vatican, who voiced the Vatican’s concerns. (Bishop Blair declined to comment). In the fall, they said, they will meet again to respond to the concerns.

“We are looking forward to clarifying some misperceptions,” Sister J. Lora Dambroski, president of the Leadership Conference, said in the e-mail message.

Besides these two investigations, another decree that affected some nuns was issued in March by the Committee on Doctrine of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. The bishops said that Catholics should stop practicing Reiki, a healing therapy that is used in some Catholic hospitals and retreat centers, and which was enthusiastically adopted by many nuns. The bishops said Reiki is both unscientific and non-Christian.

Nuns practicing reiki and running church reform groups may have finally proved too much for the church’s male hierarchy, said Kenneth Briggs, the author of “Double Crossed: Uncovering the Catholic Church’s Betrayal of American Nuns,” (Doubleday Religion, 2006).

Mr. Briggs said of the various investigations: “For some in the leadership circles in Rome and elsewhere, it’s a piece of unfinished business. It’s an effort to bring about a re-establishment of a very traditional, very conservative set of standards for what convent life is supposed to be.”

"Religious Visitators, Round 2"

"Vatican Investigating American Women’s Religious Conference"
From The National Catholic Register
By Judith Roberts

ROME — The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has decided to conduct an investigation of the 1,500-member Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR).

Reportedly, the assessment involves concerns about three areas of doctrine: the ordination of priests, the centrality of salvation through Christ, and Church teaching on homosexuality.

LCWR officers met April 22 with Cardinal William Levada, prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

The decision to investigate the LCWR comes on the heels of the decision of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life to conduct an apostolic visitation of women’s religious communities in the United States (see “Visitation Rights,” page 7).

The 53-year-old Leadership Conference consists of leaders of about 95% of the 68,000 women religious in the United States.

Bishop Leonard Blair of Toledo, Ohio, a member of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Doctrine, who is to conduct the assessment, has declined to comment on it beyond saying in a statement that he has been in contact with the leadership of the conference and that he will be reviewing “the work of the LCWR in supporting its membership as communities of faith and witness to Christ in today’s Church.”

The Leadership Conference, which also is declining interviews, said in a statement that they are facing the process with confidence in the belief that “the conference has remained faithful to its mission of service to leaders of congregations of women religious.”

However, a letter to the Leadership Conference from Cardinal William Levada, the Vatican’s point man on doctrine, quoted in the National Catholic Reporter, cites a 2001 meeting with the congregation at which the conference was told to report on any initiatives it had undertaken or planned concerning reception of the 1994 apostolic letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis about reserving priestly ordination for men; the 2000 document Dominus Jesus, which focused on Christ as humanity’s only savior; and “the problem of homosexuality.”

It went on to say that, given the tone and content of talks presented at the Leadership Conference’s annual assemblies, problems related to the 2001 request remain.

The Leadership Conference has a long history of inviting dissenting speakers who have sometimes questioned Church authority and teaching, according to Ann Carey, who spent six months researching the conference’s archives in writing the 1996 book Sisters in Crisis (Our Sunday Visitor).

As recently as 2006, Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister, an outspoken advocate of women’s ordination, gave the keynote address, and in 2007, she was presented the Leadership Conference’s outstanding leadership award.

In accepting the award, she said, “If we proclaim ourselves to be ecclesial women, we must ask if what we mean by that is that we will do what the men of the Church tell us to do or that we will do what the people of the Church need to have us do.”

Name Change

In the keynote address to the assembly in 2007, Sinsinawa Dominican Sister Laurie Brink proposed several options for religious life, one of which called for “moving beyond the Church, even beyond Jesus.” She included a disclaimer at the beginning of her talk saying her opinions did not reflect those of the Leadership Conference, the Church or her community.

Mercy Sister Doris Gottemoeller, a former Leadership Conference member who served as president of her community from 1991-99, said she thinks it is important to distinguish between what the conference says and what individual major superiors or members might say. “This is a service organization to its members,” she said. “It doesn’t oversee or have an opportunity to vet or censor what individual sisters, or even its members, say.”

However, the Leadership Conference’s own leaders have not been reticent about using the forum of the annual assemblies to question Church authority.

In the 2000 president’s address, for instance, Sister Nancy Sylvester of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary complained about Vatican officials who “see consecrated religious life as a more static life-form.”

“In their view,” Sister Nancy said, “members of religious congregations pursue holiness through the three vows, committing themselves to a corporate and institutional apostolate under the guidance of the hierarchy and in support of the magisterium. From this more static stance, religious are to hold a clear and unequivocal position in support of the authority of the hierarchy and its right to regulate religious life. To be sure, this understanding of authentic religious life does fit securely into the prevailing worldview operative in a patriarchal clerical culture. But we dare to say that we beg to differ with it.”

Sister Nancy also told of a meeting with the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life in which representatives of the Leadership Conference and the Conference of Major Superiors of Men attempted to share their “understanding of loyal dissent.”
“The meeting was difficult,” she said. “The major spokespersons for the congregation gave voice to their understanding of religious life as one in which both members and major superiors give unequivocal support to the directives of the Holy See speaking through the Vatican congregations.”

Carey said her research revealed that the relationship between the Leadership Conference and the Vatican has been a contentious one since the canonically recognized group, formerly known as the Conference of Major Religious Superiors of Women’s Institutes, changed its name in 1971 without seeking permission. It was 1974, she added, before official approval of the change was granted.

According to Carey’s book, those supporting the name change felt that the former name communicated “militaristic and hierarchical connotations.”

‘Long-Term Agenda’

In a presentation last September to the Symposium on Apostolic Religious Life at Stonehill College in Easton, Mass., Dominican Sister Elizabeth McDonough suggested that “liberal-feminist influences” co-opted the Leadership Conference at the time of the name change and that “Vatican officials noticed the difference, but failed to recognize or to address the political agenda and underlying methodology of its radical transformation.”

In turn, she said, the Leadership Conference was able to bring women’s religious communities under the control of progressive leaders, co-opting the entire course of renewal “with a liberal-feminist-ecological-social justice-oriented agenda.”

It has only been recently, Sister Elizabeth said, that more of the faithful, other religious and members of the hierarchy are recognizing “this long-term agenda is very much amiss and also harmful.”

In another presentation at the same symposium, Cardinal Franc Rodé, prefect of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, made special mention of feminism in talking about the future of women’s religious communities in North America.

Although he said men and women religious have in common such problems as “the engineering of language, the slant toward relativism, the fading of a sense of the supernatural, in some cases doubt about the relevance and centrality of Christ,” he continued, “women religious especially need to engage critically a certain strain of feminism by now outmoded, but which still nevertheless continues to exert much influence in certain circles.”

The apostolic visitation of women’s religious communities was announced shortly after the symposium. Carey, who also spoke at the event, said Cardinal Rodé was asked during the conference about the possibility of apostolic visitations to women’s communities in the United States but gave no indication they would be forthcoming.

“I think his being there certainly had to have somewhat of an effect, although Rome doesn’t do anything fast,” she said. “There must have been some concern brewing, and maybe this was the little increase in heat that made the pot boil. I can’t say it was the impetus.”

"Religious Life in the Movies"

The following is the text from the Archdiocese of Washington blog, written by Msgr. Charles Pope about the above clip:

"This is a clip I posted at Gloria.tv from the 1958 Movie, “The Nun’s Story” starring Audrey Hepburn as a young woman named Gabriel Vandermal who becomes Sr. Luke of a fictional French Women’s Order. The movie, as you shall is stunningly beautiful and the liturgical scenes are carefully done. This movie is available for purchase at Amazon.com and I recommend it to your library. However the following should be noted. The movie presents a rather negative portrait of Religious Life by emphasizing its hardships and demands to the exclusion of its joys and benefits. It more than suggests that many aspects of Religious Life at that time were unreasonable and unnecessarily harsh. Perhaps they were at times. Some older Sisters I’ve talked with tell me that many aspects of this movie are accurate and things were tough in the old days. Still, the movie surely has a strong point of view that could have been more balanced. Further, Sr. Luke makes a decision in the movie that is problematic from the point of view of the vows she made. Nevertheless, with these cautions I strongly recommend the movie. It is beautiful, though controversial in some aspects. I post the clip here in the interest of seeing a brief look at Religious life in the wider culture and in the movies. Enjoy this beautiful video."

Poor Clares of Roswell Vocations Ad

What a great ad. Click on the pictures below to see them larger.

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Click HERE to visit the Poor Clares of Roswell website.

Hat tip to Rachel Gray at Infused Knowledge

"German Elected to Lead Missionaries of Charity"

From ZENIT

Mother Teresa's Successor Steps Down

CALCUTTA, MARCH 25, 2009 (Zenit.org).- German Sister Mary Prema was elected as superior-general of the Missionaries of Charity, the congregation founded by Blessed Teresa of Calcutta.

The Union of Catholic Asian News reported today that the election took place during the congregation's general chapter, which ended today in Calcutta.

Sister Mary Prema succeeds Sister Nirmala Joshi, who has headed the congregation since the founder's death in 1997.

Sister Nirmala was re-elected for the third time, but UCAN cited sources inside the congregation that revealed she requested to be relieved of her obligations for health reasons, and because she wanted to dedicate herself to a more contemplative life within the Missionaries of Charity.

Some 163 sisters voted at the general chapter, of whom 74 are of Indian origin and the rest are from other countries of the world.

Spiritual exercises

The outgoing superior, Sister Nirmala, was invited to preach spiritual exercises to directors of Asia's diocesan Caritas chapters at a meeting planned for this September in Taipei, Taiwan.

The meeting is being organized by the Pontifical Council Cor Unum, the dicastery responsible for coordinating the charitable activities of the Catholic Church, which already convoked a similar meeting for Latin America in Guadalajara, Mexico, in June 2008.

Sources of the dicastery confirmed to ZENIT that Sister Nirmala has not declined this invitation, and will honor the commitment to preach the spiritual exercises, together with other prelates of the Asian continent.

"German Nun to Lead Missionaries of Charity"

From Earth Times

New Delhi - German-born Sister Mary Prema has been elected the new head of the Missionaries of Charity, a congregation founded by Mother Teresa in the eastern Indian city of Kolkata, a spokeswoman for the order said Thursday. The appointment has to be ratified by the Vatican.

"Sister Mary will be reaching Mother House [the global headquarters of the order in Kolkata] on Friday," said Sister Christie, spokeswoman for the Missionaries of Charity. "We will be able to give more details only after she is here."

The congregation's general chapter elected Sister Mary Prema as superior general Tuesday, Sister Christie said.

Sister Mary Prema, 55, was born as Mechtild Pierick in Recken in Germany's North Rhine-Westphalia state.

She joined Mother Teresa's order at the age of 27 and has since been a member of the congregation, serving in Rome and Nepal among other places.

Known to be close to Mother Teresa, the low-profile Sister Mary Prema is one of the seniormost nuns of the order.

She was chosen as one of the four leaders to lead the congregation at the general chapter held in 2003. The order holds a general chapter every six years to evaluate the functioning of the congregation.

The 2009 general chapter elected her to lead the order after current superior general Sister Nirmala said she wanted to dedicate herself to a more contemplative life within the Missionaries of Charity, the Union of Catholic News website reported.

Sister Nirmala, 74, has headed the Missionaries of Charity since Mother Teresa's death in 1997.

A total of 163 nuns voted at the general chapter to choose Sister Mary Prema to take over as the new leader, the Union of Catholic Asian News reported.

Seventy-four of the nuns were from India and the rest were from the more than 130 countries where the order has branches.

Albania-born Mother Teresa lived and worked in Kolkata for more than 45 years ministering to the sick, dying and orphans. She founded the Missionaries of Charity in 1950.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner was beatified by Pope John Paul II and given the title Blessed Teresa of Kolkata in 2003.

The Missionaries of Charity now has more than 4,000 nuns as part of the order and runs more than 700 branches round the world.

"Nun beaten and robbed in Upper Darby; 2 youths sought"

From the Philadelphia Daily News
By Stephanie Farr

UPPER DARBY, Pa. - An 82-year-old nun lay motionless in an Upper Darby church parking lot after she was brutally robbed and beaten last week, until a schoolboy came to her aid.

"God sent him to save her, to save her life," said the Rev. Peter Quinn, pastor of St. Alice's Church, adding that the nun considers the still-unidentified boy her "angel."

Now, Upper Darby police are hoping for a break in the unsolved robbery.

The attack on the nun, who is with the Dominican Order and lives at the convent in St. Alice's parish complex, on Hampden Road near Sansom Street, happened about 3 p.m. Feb. 2 in the complex parking lot as she returned from service work in Philadelphia, Upper Darby Police Superintendent Michael Chitwood said.

The nun, who has not been named by police or the church, was in her off-white habit, carrying her purse in a canvas bag, when she heard someone calling out to her, according to police.

When she turned around, she was punched in the face and fell to the pavement, semiconscious, Chitwood said.

The nun remembers little about her attackers but believes that there were two, and that her main assailant appeared to be between 13 and 15 years old, Chitwood said.

While she was on the ground, the attackers pulled at her bag, all the while kicking and stomping her, not quitting until she let go of her bag, according to police.

The thieves got away with her identification card, her Social Security card, her keys and a few bank cards, Chitwood said.

After the attackers fled on Hampden Road, the nun lay frightened and paralyzed until a boy with a bookbag attended to her and rang the convent door for help, Quinn said.

"One bad kid and one good kid," Quinn said.

"Pray for the [bad kid] who had a bad experience in his early childhood, so that he could learn from that and be better.

"And thank God for the angel."

The nun suffered a fractured pelvis, injuries to her right eye and a facial cut that required five stitches, police said.

She was taken to Delaware County Memorial Hospital, where she was treated and released, and she has since had trouble walking, Chitwood said.

The parish complex is directly across the street from the site of a brutal November home invasion in which Hoa Pham, a Vietnamese immigrant and an active member of St. Alice's Parish, was murdered.

His alleged killer, Jermaine Burgess, was held for trial after a preliminary hearing Monday.

"It makes a person feel that these two things have followed one another in too short a period of time," Quinn said.

"English nun who hid Jews from Nazis could become a saint"

From the Daily Mail

By Simon Caldwell

Photo at left: Mother Ricarda Beauchamp Hambrough let Jews hide in the Casa di San Brigida convent in Rome during the Second World War

A little-known English nun who helped to hide Italian Jews from the Nazis in wartime Rome is being considered as a possible saint.

Mother Ricarda Beauchamp Hambrough is credited with playing a vital role in saving the lives of more than 60 Jews by smuggling them into her convent.

The Bridgettines, the order to which she belonged, have now applied to the Vatican for permission to open her cause for sainthood.

If granted she will become one of four British women whose sainthood cases are under consideration by the Church.

The early stages of her cause will involve the examination of her life for evidence of ‘heroic virtue’, before two miracles will be sought to confirm her saintly status.

But if it progresses swiftly, she could become the first British woman saint since 1970 when Pope Paul VI canonised three women among 40 English and Welsh saints who died as martyrs in the Protestant Reformation.

Mother Ricarda was born Madaleina Catherine in London on 10 September 1887 and was received into the Roman Catholic Church in Brighton when she was four years old after her Anglican parents, Windsor and Louise, converted to the faith.

Little is known about her childhood but as a young woman she fell under the influence of Father Benedict Williamson, a London-based Benedictine monk, and in 1912, at the age of 24, she travelled to Rome to become a nun.

She was following in the footsteps of a group of three other English girls who had set out a year earlier wanting to join the Bridgettines, a 14th century order which had all but died out until it was re-established in 1911 by Blessed Mary Elizabeth Hasselblad, a Swedish convert from Lutheranism.

She took the religious name Ricarda and was soon chosen as the assistant to Blessed Mary Elizabeth, the abbess.

In the following decades she was at her superior’s side as the order won canonical approval from the Pope and, attracting a large number of vocations, began to open religious houses in Sweden, England, India and Italy.

The order also secured a mother house in Piazza Farnese in historic Rome, a grand building standing on the site of the house of the order’s original founder, St Bridget, a patron saint of Europe.

But within years of moving into new home war broke out and the activities of Mother Ricarda and her fellow nuns were soon concentrated on helping the victims of the conflict.

Pope Pius XII secretly ordered the religious houses of Rome to shelter Jews after the Gestapo seized 1,007 Jews during a sweep of the city on 16 October 1943.

He had protested vigorously to the Germans about the round-up but none of those arrested was released.

Mother Ricarda and Mother Mary Elizabeth then willingly gave refuge to scores of Italian Jews, Communists and Poles fleeing in terror from the Nazis.

A source within the Bridgettines has confirmed that Mother Ricarda was at the heart of the enterprise in hiding refugees.

She said: ‘We were helping many Jewish people during the war and Mother Ricarda was helping Mother Elizabeth to hide them.’

Mother Ricarda’s efforts to save Jewish lives is bound to feature strongly in persuading the Vatican that she is a saint – as it was also a factor in her abbess’s own swift elevation to beatification.

This was apparent when Pope John Paul II beatified Blessed Mary Elizabeth in 1999, noting in his homily the ‘care and concern’ Ricarda’s former boss had shown to ‘the persecuted Jewish people’ and ‘those who suffered because of racial laws’.

A year after the war, the Chief Rabbi of Rome, Israel Zolli, a friend of both Ricarda and Blessed Mary Elizabeth, converted to the Catholic faith – partly because he was so impressed by the efforts of Catholics to save Jewish lives. He took as his Christian name Eugenio – after the Pope Pius, the previous Eugenio Pacelli.

Pope Pius was severely criticised after his death for not speaking out directly against the Holocaust, but he was convinced this would have backfired both against the Jews and Church.
However, his policy of opening up the churches to those fleeing persecution was that an estimated 85 per cent of Roman Jews were able to escape the Nazis.

Blessed Mary Elizabeth died in 1957, and Mother Ricarda succeeded her as abbess until her own death on 26 June 1966 at the age of 79.

The pair are buried in the same grave in the convent church where they hid so many people from persecution.

Once the nuns have established that Mother Ricarda lived a life of heroic virtue the file on her life will be passed over to the Vatican.

Two miracles are then needed be fore she can be made a saint – the first for her beatification when she will be declared Blessed and the second for her ultimate canonisation.
A file is also being prepared on the cause for sainthood of Katherine Flanagan, a Londoner who joined the Bridgettines a year before Ricarda.

Father Ray Blake, the parish priest of St Mary Magdalen Church in Brighton, where Ricarda was baptised, said he was ‘terribly excited’ at the prospect of having a saint associated with his church.

"Cloister nuns reach out through world wide web"

From the Times of Malta

By Fiona Galea Debono

St Ursula's Monastery in Valletta may not be as cut off from the outside world as it would appear through the bars that block away the nuns beyond - it plans to move with the times, as far as possible, and its own website is testimony to that.

Although the cloister nuns do not have direct access to the feedback they receive, any e-mails are printed out and forwarded to them, while the seminarians handling the site reply on their behalf.

And computer-literate Sr Christine Vella, 28, who brought the first PC into the monastery with the money she received when she entered in 2002, has more IT-advanced ideas.

She is not excluding the possibility of introducing the internet into their midst, aware, however, that she may not have the time for it. Apart from being busy, the last time she had access to the internet, she became addicted to chatting.

More importantly though, it would not be readily accepted by the other nuns, in particular the more elderly, for whom "it is not a part of their lives as it is ours".

It is not surprising that one of the older nuns was bewildered when she received digital photos from her relatives in the US. She asked how they got there... and was shown the "magical" pen drive, the gadget Sr Christine passes back and forth through the metal mesh as a means of exchanging information. The mesmerised septuagenarian still cannot grasp how it works.

The nuns have, however, warmed up to the website, appreciating the response and the community promotion it is aimed at.

"It is still early for the internet but the fact that they have accepted the website is a major step," says Sr Christine.

And she does understand the concerns surrounding its infiltrating the monastery, whose inhabitants only leave it once a year - normally for health reasons.

"It is mainly the pornographic material and filth that is keeping the internet out. It takes nothing to press the wrong button and find a pornographic scene in front of your face," Sr Christine says.

The self-confessed addict to chat rooms would spend hours at it while she was at the University and even recalls the indecent advances she would receive from a "sex-saturated" cyberspace, openly listing the impertinent questions about her likes and dislikes, which often compelled her to log off.

Sr Christine is on a mission to attract more nuns to the cloistered community - and judging by her jolly demeanour and passion for life, cutting off from the world cannot be such a scary notion.
In fact, for Sr Christine, leaving the monastery is far scarier. "Even before I entered, I used to be unnerved. Now, I feel it even more. We all get a dizzy sensation when we walk out of the door and come back feeling faint."

Fifteen nuns, aged between 18 and 81, live in the monastery and two more entered over the last two years. But there are gaps when no one knocks on the door three times - as the entry ritual requires.

"The more, the merrier," she giggles through the grille, admitting that outside prayer time, it is a party inside and "we have such a good laugh together".

The cloister nuns are by no means a dying breed. In fact, they are the youngest community, she declares. But the reality is "it is never enough".

More nuns are also needed to carry out all the "obediences" - Sr Vella is responsible for looking after the sick but she is also helping out with the cooking these days.

"The safety of a nation depends on the number of contemplatives," she proudly quotes. The words had struck her and she explains that "our role is to build a closer union with God. The monastery's charisma is, after all, intercessory prayer".

The media-savvy nun is using any means to recruit more girls, reiterating that it was an interview in The Times on the monastery in 2001 that sealed the deal for her. She had been toying with the idea for six years but when she read it she knew where she wanted to go so she quit University.

God had used the journalist to accomplish His mission, she laughs, reassuring that it was not the latter's sole responsibility.

But it is probably her down-to-earth, no-frills approach that has the most magnetic pull - Sr Christine admits she only decided to spend her first weekend at the monastery to take a break from her studies... That experience grew from a weekend to a lifetime.

The website, www.orderofmalta-malta.org/stursula, offers information on the monthly meetings organised for girls aged 12 upwards.

"In Italy, convents are emptying"

From St. Louis Today
By Christine Spolar
MCT
11/27/2008

BOLOGNA, Italy — This city of red brick towers and delicately painted porticoes once boasted the most convents of any city in Italy: Nearly 100 sanctuaries sprang up in the 16th century for women committed to teaching, caring for the ill and giving their lives to God.

These days, the nuns of Bologna are part of an uncomfortable countdown in Italy and the rest of the Roman Catholic world. Every week, it seems, there are fewer nuns, fewer convents with full houses and almost no Italians who care to make the commitment to a wholly religious life.

Schools and hospitals, in particular, have seen a loyal work force wane. Nuns from the order of Serve di Maria Addolorata di Chioggia left their convent in the Villa Erbosa private hospital in the last week of October. There were four sisters left of the dozens who used to cater to the physical and spiritual needs of the sick.

Across town at Ospedale Sant’Orsola, 40 nuns were among the caregivers. Now there are six, and they are mostly too old to work hard or long. Sister Superior Maria, 79, admits no one else is knocking at the door.

Schools in this renowned university town long ago gave up relying on Italian nuns as educators. The drop in nurses parallels work trends across Italy. The most fresh-faced nuns and novices taking up the hard chores in Bologna now hail from Africa and India.

The most populous convent — with 300 nuns — is home to mostly African and Indian women. It is a cultural leap in conservative Italy, where immigration itself is relatively new. As one nun explained: "Our culture is a European culture and theirs is completely different. ... Sometimes the Italians misunderstand them and sometimes they misunderstand the Italians. It’s not constant, but no doubt there are difficulties."

But the new novices also bear some things in common to their Italian elders. They do not come from wealth or have expectations that, as Sister Maria explained, can overshadow their religious prospects.

"The young in Italy have TV. They have cell phones. They have these laptops they carry around," the nun said quietly, her slight voice echoing across the wide hallway of the convent. "When you are going to discos, how can you expect to hear the word of God? You need silence to hear God."

The vanishing of Italian nuns reflects a decades-long trend within the Roman Catholic Church, as gender barriers in education and jobs fell in Western countries.

Changing demographics also played a role. Smaller families — Italy has one of the lowest birthrates in Europe — meant fewer parents were seeking help from the church.

When families were larger, they were more likely to send a girl to a convent, said 80-year-old Sister Domenica Cremonini, who first walked into Visitandine dell’Immacolata when she was 11. Sister Domenica, a tiny, bright-eyed keeper of the faith, is also the keeper of records inside the vast monastery walls.

The oldest nun among the seven sisters of the Visitandine is 94, she said. The last novice who came under Sister Domenica’s watch is now 70. Still, this convent is doing well compared to its neighbors. Down the street, at Figlie del Sacro Cuore di Gesu, the number of nuns has slipped to two — one below the standard that designates a religious community.

Sister Enrica Martignoni, who directs novice schools in Bologna, said the number of nuns has dropped by more than a third in Italy since the 1990s. Recent years add little hope: In 2007 there were 856 nuns. In 2008 the figure fell to 808.

"When I joined, you’d have 25 novices in a class. Now you might have one," Sister Enrica said. "And yes, of course, we worry. There are a lot of people who pray over this."

Sister Domenica said she believes young religious women working in the community are an important spiritual component to well-being.

"We nuns add something. In the hospital, they tell me we are like good health — and when we are not around, you fall sick. I am not saying the doctors or nurses are not good, but nuns bring another kind of spirit."

The Vatican has reported in statistical surveys that the number of Catholics in religious orders around the world has declined. The latest worldwide data from 2006 found 993,171 active and cloistered nuns — a drop of 7,887 from 2005. The biggest drop was seen among active community-based nuns, with 753,400 in 2006, down from 760,529. Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate focused on the U.S. nun population since 1965, when there were 173,865 religious women. By 2000 the U.S. nun population had dropped to 80,000, records show.

Native-born Italians who come to convents now tend to be older, more educated and much more weary of the worldly life they have been leading. All the nuns interviewed said they see a spurt in the proportion of nuns seeking the cloistered life.

"There’s a lack of nuns," Sister Enrica said. "But if someone wants to become a nun, more and more, she wants to be in a cloister.

"Perhaps when you face so much superficiality in life, people want to pull away from it all," she said. "They feel a need for an interior life. Because society doesn’t offer that much anymore."

Beautiful Slideshow about Cloistered Nuns

Go to the website of photographer Toni Greaves and click the link for "Radical Love". The multimedia slideshow is about 6 minutes long, but it is worth the download time.

H/t to the Anchoress

Newly Canonized St. Alphonsa dedicated herself to Jesus at age 7

From The Times of India

VATICAN: Kerala nun Sister Alphonsa, who at the age of seven had dedicated herself to serving Jesus Christ, calling him "my divine Spouse", was greatly disturbed when her family decided to get her married at 13.

She prayed fervently and even contemplated disfiguring herself to escape the torment, according to a biography of her prepared by the Vatican ahead of her canonisation Sunday.

Following is the biography of Sister Alphonsa prepared by the Vatican:

"Blessed Alphonsa of the immaculate conception was born in Kudamalur, the Arpookara region, in the diocese of Changanacherry, India, on the 19th of August 1910, of the ancient and noble family of Muttathupadathu.

From her birth, the life of the Blessed was marked by the cross, which would be progressively revealed to her as the royal way to conform herself to Christ. Her mother, Maria Puthukari, gave birth to her prematurely, in her eight month of pregnancy, as a result of a fright she received when, during the sleep, a snake wrapped itself around her waist. Eight days later, the 28 of August, the child was baptised according to the Syro-Malabar rite by the Fr. Joseph Chackalayil, and she received the name Annakutty, a diminutive of Anne. She was the last of five children.

Her mother died three months later. Annakutty passed her early infancy in the home of her grandparents in Elumparambil. There she lived a particularly happy time because of her human and Christian formation, during which the first seeds of a vocation flowered. Her grand-mother, a pious and charitable woman, communicated the joy of the faith, love for prayer and a surge of charity towards the poor to her. At five years of age the child already knew how to lead, with a totally childish enthusiasm, the evening prayer of the family gathered, in accordance with the Syro-Malabar custom, in the "prayer room".

Annakutty received the Eucharistic bread for the first time on the 11 of November 1917. She used to say to her friends: "Do you know why I am so particularly happy today? It is because I have Jesus in my heart!” In a letter to her spiritual father, on the 30 of November 1943, she confided the following: "Already from the age of seven I was no longer mine. I was totally dedicated to my divine Spouse. Your reverence knows it well".

In the same year of 1917 she began to attend the elementary school of Thonnankuzhy, where she also established a sincere friendship with the Hindu children. When the first school cycle ended in 1920, the time had come to transfer to Muttuchira, to the house of her aunt Anna Murickal, to whom her mother, before she died, had entrusted her as her adoptive mother.

Her aunt was a severe and demanding woman, at times despotic and violent in demanding obedience from Annakutty in her every minimal disposition or desire. Assiduous in her religious practice, she accompanied her niece, but did not share the young girl's friendship with the Carmelites of the close-by Monastery or her long periods of prayer at the foot of the altar. She was, in fact, determined to procure an advantageous marriage for Annakutty, obstructing the clear signs of her religious vocation.

The virtue of the Blessed was manifested in accepting this severe and rigid education as a path of humility and patience for the love of Christ, and tenaciously resisted the reiterated attempts at engagement to which the aunt tried to oblige her. Annakutty, in order to get out from under a commitment to marriage, reached the point of voluntarily causing herself a grave burn by putting her foot into a heap of burning embers. "My marriage was arranged when I was thirteen years old. What had I to do to avoid it? I prayed all that night... then an idea came tome. If my body were a little disfigured no one would want me! ... O, how I suffered! I offered all for my great intention".

The proposal to defile her singular beauty did not fully succeed in freeing her from the attentions of suitors. During the following years the Blessed had to defend her vocation, even during the year of probation when an attempt to give her in marriage, with the complicity of the Mistress of Formation herself, was made. "O, the vocation which I received! A gift of my good God!.... God saw the pain of my soul in those days. God distanced the difficulties and established me in this religious state".

It was Fr. James Muricken, her confessor, who directed her towards Franciscan spirituality and put her in contact with the Congregation of the Franciscan Clarists. Annakutty entered their college in Bharananganam in the diocese of Palai, to attend seventh class, as an intern student, on the 24th of May 1927. The following year, on the 2nd of August 1928, Annakutty began her postulancy, taking the name of Alphonsa of the Immaculate Conception in honour of St. Alphonsus Liguori, whose feast it was that day. She was clothed in the religious habit on the 19th of May 1930, during the first pastoral visit made to Bharananganam by the Bishop, Msgr. James Kalacherry.

The period 1930-1935 was characterised by grave illness and moral suffering. She could teach the children in the school at Vakakkad only during the scholastic year 1932. Then, because of her weakness, she carried out the duties of assistant-teacher and catechist in the parish. She was engaged also as secretary, especially to write official letters because of her beautiful script.

The canonical novitiate was introduced into the Congregation of the Franciscan Clarists in 1934. Though wishing to enter immediately, the Blessed was only admitted on the 12th of August 1935 because of her ill health. About one week after the beginning of her novitiate, she had a haemorrhage from the nose and eyes and a profound organic wasting and purulent wounds on her legs. The illness deteriorated, to such a point that the worst was feared.

Heaven came to the rescue of the holy novice. During a novena to The Servant of God Fr. Kuriakose Elia Chavara - a Carmelite who today is a Blessed-she wasmiraculously and instantaneously cured.

Having restarted her novitiate, she wrote the following proposals in her spiritual diary: "I do not wish to act or speak according to my inclinations. Every time I fail, I will do penance... I want to be careful never to reject anyone. I will only speak sweet words to others. I want to control my eyes with rigour. I will ask pardon of the Lord for every little failure and I will atone for it through penance. No matter what my sufferings may be, I will never complain and if I have to undergo any humiliation, I will seek refuge in the Sacred Heart of Jesus".

The 12th of August 1936, the feast of St. Clare, the day of her perpetual profession, was a day of inexpressible spiritual joy. She had realised her desire, guarded for a long time in her heart and confided to her sister Elizabeth when she was only 12 years old: "Jesus is my only Spouse, and none other".

Jesus, however, wished to lead His spouse to perfection through a life of suffering. "I made my perpetual profession on the 12th of August 1936 and came here to Bharanganam on the following 14th. From that time, it seems, I was entrusted with a part of the cross of Christ. There are abundant occasions of suffering... I have a great desire to suffer with joy. It seems that my Spouse wishes to fulfil this desire".

Painful illnesses followed each other: typhoid fever, double pneumonia, and, the most serious of all, a dramatic nervous shock, the result of a fright on seeing a thief during the night of the 18th of October 1940. Her state of psychic incapacity lasted for about a year, during which she was unable to read or write.

In every situation, Sister Alphonsa always maintained a great reservation and charitable attitude towards the Sisters, silently undergoing her sufferings. In 1945 she had a violent outbreak of illness. A tumour, which had spread throughout her organs, transformed her final year of life into a continuous agony. Gastroenteritis and liver problems caused violent convulsions and vomiting up to forty times a day: "I feel that the Lord has destined me to be an oblation, a sacrifice of suffering... I consider a day in which I have not suffered as a day lost to me".

With this attitude of a victim for the love of the Lord, happy until the final moment and with a smile of innocence always on her lips, Sister Alphonsa quietly and joyfully brought her earthly journey to a close in the convent of the Franciscan Clarists at Bharananganam at 12.30 on the 28th July 1946, leaving behind the memory of a Sister full of love and a saint.

Alphonsa of the Immaculate Conception Muttathupadathu was proclaimed blessed by Pope John Paul II in Kottayam, India, on the 8th of February 1986.

With today's Canonisation, the Church in India presents its first Saint to the veneration of the faithful of the whole world. Faithful from every part of the world have come together in a single act of thanksgiving to God in her name and in a sign of the great oriental and western traditions, Roman and Malabar, which Sr. Alphonsa lived and harmonised in her saintly life.

"Nuns on recruitment run seek single, young Sisters"

The Catholic Church in Ireland is increasing efforts to sign people up as nuns and priests as part of a special year of vocations

From the TimesOnline

By Gabrielle Monaghan

Fancy a weekend away with the girls, with free meals, board and no men to bother you? Look no further. All you need is a love of prayer, silence . . . and a devotion to God.

The Redemptoristine Sisters, an enclosed order at the St Alphonsus Monastery in Drumcondra, is looking for single women aged 25 to 45 to join in their life of “prayer, liturgy and work” next weekend. Guests, however, must be interested in “finding out more about a monastic vocation”.

If a more rural getaway appeals, the Sisters of Mercy will be holding a “vocation discernment” at the same time in Glenstal Abbey, Limerick and Spiddal, Co Galway. Potential nuns can also stay with the Poor Clares in Carlow the last Sunday of every month.

The invitations are part of increased recruitment efforts during the Irish Catholic Church’s special year of vocations, which runs through May 2009. Other steps to swell the ranks include targeting careers and graduate fairs.

“We have limited room so we usually take four women at weekends,” said Sr Gabrielle Fox, prioress of the Redemptoristine Nuns in Ireland. “There are no strings and we don’t chase after them if they are not interested in joining.”

In the past three years, five young women have joined the sisters, but Sr Gabrielle said prior to that the figure was “nil” for “some time”.

Sr Monica Boggen, 25, a former secretary and childminder from Co Meath, was one of three young women to join this year. She spent a weekend with the sisters in April 2007 after seeing a notice in Maynooth College and stayed.

“I felt called at the age of 12, but it took me a while to find the right place,” Sr Monica said. “I tried Mother Teresa’s order in Italy in 2006, but after three months I came home. It was a positive experience but I felt there was something missing.

“Because I was invited in by the Sisters, I felt they were really open. I joined in January. It’s an enclosed order, but I don’t feel closed in. I felt at home in the community.”

Sr Gabrielle is hopeful that new recruitment methods and the Catholic Church’s growing use of technology to give lay people an insight into life at religious orders — the monastery has a webcam in its chapel — will persuade more people to join religious orders.

In 2007, 228 nuns died but only two new recruits took final vows, the most recent figures from the Irish Catholic Directory show. Only nine men were ordained last year, while 160 priests died. “The year of the vocation is an opportunity for everyone to ratchet up their energy around the area of recruitment for religious life and priesthood,” said Fr Paddy Rushe, national co-ordinator of diocesan vocations, at his parochial house in Dundalk.

Recent initiatives from Vocations Ireland include an exhibition stand at the Fas Opportunities careers fair and the GradIreland graduate recruitment fair.

“We like to think our presence at recruitment fairs is getting the details out there. People see priests with fresher eyes than in the past,” Fr Rushe said.

Other initiatives include ads for priests in the Garda Review, the education sections of Sunday newspapers, personal ads in the Irish Times and advertising on the Eircom website.

“Because of the fast pace of life, people don’t take the time to listen if they are called to God,” Fr Rushe said. “Sometimes you need an obvious reminder, like a poster or an ad to prompt you to look within again. It’s like a little wake-up call.”

"Today's Nun Has A Veil--And A Blog"

From TIME
By Tracy Schmidt, Lisa Takeuchi Cullen

emphases and (comments) mine - BW

For the iPod generation, it doesn't get more radical than wearing a veil. The hijab worn by traditional Muslim women might have people talking, but it's the wimple that really turns heads. And in the U.S. today, the nuns most likely to wear that headdress are the ones young enough to have a playlist.

Over the past five years, Roman Catholic communities around the country have experienced a curious phenomenon: more women, most in their 20s and 30s, are trying on that veil. Convents in Nashville, Tenn.; Ann Arbor, Mich.; and New York City all admitted at least 15 entrants over the past year and fielded hundreds of inquiries. One convent is hurriedly raising funds for a new building to house the inflow, and at another a rush of new blood has lowered the median age of its 225 sisters to 36. Catholic centers at universities, including Illinois and Texas A&M, report growing numbers of women entering discernment, or the official period of considering a vocation. Career women seeking more meaning in their lives and empty-nest moms are also finding their way to convent doors.

This is a welcome turnabout for the church. As opportunities opened for women in the 1960s and '70s, fewer of them viewed the asceticism and confinements of religious life as a tempting career choice (Once again, it is NOT a career choice. If that were what religious life was, no one would join - it would be a pretty poor "career" choice.). Since 1965, the number of Catholic nuns in the U.S. has declined from 179,954 to just 67,773, according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University. The average age of nuns today is 69. But over the past decade or so, expressing their religious beliefs openly has become hip for many young people, a trend intensified among Catholic women by the charismatic appeal of Pope John Paul II's youth rallies and his interpretation of modern feminism as a way for women to express Christian values.

As this so-called JP2 generation has come of age, religious orders have begun to reach out again to young people--and to do so in the language that young people speak. Convents conduct e-mail correspondence with interested women, blogs written by sisters give a peek into the habited life and websites offer online personality questionnaires to test vocations. One site, Vocation-network.org frames the choice much like a dating service, with Christ as the ultimate match. "For a long time, we neglected to invite people to see what we are about," says Sister Doris Gottemoeller of the Institute of the Sisters of Mercy of America, a national order. "I think we're more ready to do that now."

And although the extreme conservatism (Strange way to put it - most in religious life would see it as the most liberating and free life.) of a nun's life may seem wholly countercultural for young American women today, that is exactly what attracts many of them, say experts and the women themselves. "Religious life itself is a radical choice," says Brother Paul Bednarczyk, executive director of the National Religious Vocation Conference in Chicago. "In an age where our primary secular values are sex, power and money, for someone to choose chastity, obedience and poverty is a radical statement."

That radicalism is, ironically, embodied by the wearing of the veil. Decreed unnecessary by Vatican II (Say what? Where is that in the Documents of Vatican II? Number 17 of Perfectae Caritatis says - "The religious habit, an outward mark of consecration to God, should be simple and modest, poor and at the same becoming. In addition it must meet the requirements of health and be suited to the circumstances of time and place and to the needs of the ministry involved. The habits of both men and women religious which do not conform to these norms must be adapted." Funny, I don't see the part about veils being decreed unnecessary. In fact I also don't see the part where is says stop wearing the habit.) and shed happily by many older nuns, the headdress is for many of today's newcomers a desired accessory. "A lot of my older sisters would never wear the veil," says Sister Sarah Roy, 29, who is the only member of her Sisters of St. Francis of the Immaculate Conception in Peoria, Ill., to do so. (The others wear a simple dark dress adorned by a pin.) Though she admits "people just stare at you like you're a freak," she adds, "It's a trend (If you consider centuries upon centuries a trend - perhaps not wearing the veil is the trend.)with younger women wanting to wear the veil now."

Newer nuns see the veil as a public expression of faith, says Cheryl Reed, author of Unveiled: Inside the Hidden Lives of Nuns. "You can understand why a woman who has given up sex, freedom and money would want to wear her wedding dress--which is what they consider their habits to be. You want to say, 'I'm special. I gave this up.'" (I don't know many Sisters wearing habits, and I know quite a few, that would say, "I'm special. I gave this up." Quite the opposite really.)

Katharine Johnson isn't sure yet which wedding dress she will choose--a white one or a black one. At 21, she is in her third year of discernment. For now the senior at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign dresses as her classmates do, though on her ring finger she wears a miniature rosary and a favorite T shirt reads, EVERYONE LOVES A CATHOLIC GIRL. She still dates but limits physical contact to kissing. "As I date men and I date convents, I am waiting for God to say, 'This is where your heart belongs,'" she says.

Becoming a nun typically takes seven to nine years. After the period of discernment, a woman enters a religious community as a postulant, and she reflects upon her vocation and helps with chores around the convent. At the end of what is primarily a yearlong spiritual retreat, the postulant and her advisers in the community decide whether she will become a novice and study Catholic theology and ministry for up to two years. She may then take her temporary vows. After an additional four to eight years during which she serves the convent's mission, she makes her final vows and becomes a professed nun.

At the Sisters of Life Formation House in the Bronx, N.Y., 16 young women are making their way through that journey. They include a former Marine, a professional opera singer, a United Nations aide and a recent Yale grad. They have left behind paychecks, apartments, even boyfriends. Sister Thérèse Saglimbeni, 27, a novice who joined the convent in 2005, recalls watching the sisters playing volleyball while she was a student at the nearby State University of New York Maritime College. "I was with my boyfriend and had said how fun the sisters looked," she says. "He said, 'Well, why don't you join them?' And I replied, 'Well, maybe I will!'"

The other sisters chuckle when Saglimbeni recounts her saucy retort. But many of their loved ones feel less jovial about the women's decision to take the veil. "For those who are called, there is a real falling in love. You are filled with a joy and desire to be with God," says Sister Mary Gabriel Devlin, 32, vocation director at Sisters of Life. "Their families are not experiencing this, so it can be hard for them to understand." The sense of alienation can be even greater when women choose an order that isolates them from their families and others so that they can devote themselves to strict schedules of regimented prayer. Convents like Sisters of Life that combine contemplation with active ministry to the public are the most popular among young women.

Read the rest of the article HERE.

An Interview with Mother Dolores Hart

From Catholic Exchange.com
By Barbara Middleton

Once an in-demand Hollywood actress, Dolores Hart shocked the entertainment industry when she gave up everything to become a cloistered Benedictine Roman Catholic nun. She left her career, broke off her engagement to Los Angeles businessman Don Robinson, and pursued her vocation as a nun.

Mother Dolores’ career started in 1956 at the age of 18 years. Early on, her career took off as she played the love interest to Elvis Presley in the 1957 release Loving You. After this appearance, Dolores found herself in frequent demand, and she made two more films before playing with Presley again in 1958’s King Creole. She then debuted on Broadway, winning a 1959 Theatre World Award as well as a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actress for her role in The Pleasure of His Company. In 1960, Dolores starred in Where the Boys Are, a teenage comedy about college students on spring break which developed a near cult-like following.

Dolores Hart went on to star in four more films, including the lead role in Lisa which was based a novel by Jan de Hartog and nominated for a Golden Globe for “Best Picture - Drama”. She was considered one of Hollywood’s rising stars and was cast for roles in Wild is the Wind, The Plunderers, Francis of Assisi, Sail a Crooked Ship and Lonelyhearts, with Montgomery Clift. Her last role was opposite Hugh O’Brian in 1963’s Come Fly with Me.

Barbara Middleton: When did you receive the call from Paramount Studios?

Mother Dolores: In the middle of charm class, at Marymount, I received a call from Paramount studios! It was the associate producer of Hal Wallis and he wanted me to come to Paramount for a meeting. The teacher didn’t want me to take the call — she thought it was a sham. I took the call.

They wanted to meet me that afternoon, maybe in a half hour, at Paramount. Indeed, I wanted to meet them, too. My friend, Don Barbeau, came to pick me up in a 1938 hearse. I had on my letter sweater and socks and went to see Mr. Hal Wallis. He asked me, “What do you want to do with your life?”

I responded quickly and said, “I want to be an actress.”

“We’re doing a picture with Mr. Presley and we want you to start next week.” I didn’t even know who Elvis Presley was but the next week were the final tests at school. I said, “Does it have to be next week?” His reply, “Yes, it does!”

Mother Gabriel, the Dean of girls, came to see me and told me, “Kids in the drama school want an opportunity like what you’re going for. Dolores this is the big one. Go for it!” I said, “Okay, okay!” I took her advice, did the screen test and got the part.

The cameraman asked, “Miss Hart, who taught you technique on film? Where did you go to school?”

“I never went to school for such.”

“You certainly know what to do.”

Finally the call came and I would start filming with Mr. Presley. I met with Wallie Westmore for make up and Edith Head to design my wardrobe for the movie Loving You.

Barbara Middleton: I know you play the clarinet. Did you play the clarinet for Elvis?

Mother Dolores: Well, two years later, I did another picture with Elvis Presley. Jan Shepherd played Elvis’ sister in the film. It was her birthday and we had a party for her at my house. Elvis came to the birthday party. I played the clarinet and Elvis sat down and played the piano. We played a few tunes for Jan’s birthday. He was quite a gentleman — a quality of simplicity, humor, and shyness about him. It was very much his persona at that time.

When we were making King Creole, he had so many people after him — you couldn’t walk through the streets in New Orleans. It was like a circus. You would not believe the crowds. Policemen were everywhere. We had to go to hotel rooms to wait in between scenes. When we finally got to the site, we were ushered into the elevator, [and] in the hotel rooms. There would be boards built from one hotel to another. We crossed over to another hotel and would go down the elevator and enter another room. They’d bring us sandwiches. Elvis would open the Gideon Bible, as that was the version placed in the hotel rooms. Whatever passage he’d open it to, we would talk about it. He would ask me, “What do you think of this passage?”

Barbara Middleton: How did you happen to come to visit the Abbey?

Mother Dolores: In 1959, I was in a play in New York, The Pleasure of His Company. A friend invited me to meet some nuns and she said, “They are very special. I exclaimed, “NUNS! No, I don’t want to meet nuns.”

But my friend said, “Did I ever steer you wrong?” and I said, “No.” So, I came to Regina Laudis — after a few hours here, it has a definite call. You feel you’re in a special place. Well, after the first visit, I kept coming back in between shows. Eventually, I asked the Reverend Mother if she thought I had a vocation. She said, “No, no; go back and do your movie thing. You’re too young.”

I did, and then did some more films: Where the Boys Are and St. Francis of Assisi which took me to Rome. I met Pope John XXIII and he was very instrumental in helping me form my ideas about a vocation. When I was introduced to the Pope, I said, “I am Dolores Hart, the actress playing Clara.” He said, “NO, you are Clara! (”Tu sei Chiara” — in Italian). Thinking he had misunderstood me, I said, “No, I am Dolores Hart, an actress portraying Clara.” Pope John XXIII looked me square in the eye and stated, “NO. You are Clara!” His statement stayed with me and rang in my ears many times.

Barbara Middleton: Reverend Mother, would you please tell us about your engagement before entering the Abbey?

Mother Dolores: A very wonderful experience for Don Robison and [me]. He had a feeling that I might have a “calling.” He wanted to try the engagement: “Let’s give this a try.” Several days went by and we were driving down the road when he stopped the car. Don said, “Something isn’t right. Do you love me?”

“Of course, Don, I love you.” He asked again, and then said, “Something in you is not with me.”

When I returned home at 1 a.m., I called and got a flight for 6 a.m. to Regina Laudis. God is far from all of us until we get into the reality of ourselves. I finally came to say — in my heart more than anything and then openly to myself: “My search for God was a marital search.”

When I spoke to Don again — he knew, because a man knows — every human being knows when something is real. We were at supper and I didn’t have my ring on. Don said, “I know…I’ve known it. This is what you’ve got to do and I’ve got to do this with you. We’ve got to do this together.”

That was an amazing gift — and all these years he’s been like that. Don says, “Every love doesn’t have to wind up at the altar.”

Many relationships can wind up a lot worse. He never married. Don comes every year at Christmas and Easter. He wants to do whatever he can for the community.

Barbara Middleton: If you had to do it again, would you do it?

Mother Dolores: I would hope I would have the courage to do it again. My vocation has been most fulfilling and gratifying.”

Barbara Middleton: You walked away from Hollywood. Why?

Mother Dolores: I never considered my decision as “walking away from Hollywood,” Barbara. I felt it was more — walking into something more significant and by that, I took Hollywood with me. I really loved my work and the people I worked with. [Mother Dolores is still a voting member of the Academy.]