Word: conventions
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...decide that the only way to live her faith is to jump out of the box. In recent years, the church in the U.S. has suffered a small but steady loss among its 181,400 sisters. In the Archdiocese of New York, for example, 47 nuns left their convents last year, twice as many as in 1965. Some church officials estimate that resignations from the nation's sisterhoods have more than doubled in the past five years. What particularly worries them is that many of the ex-sisters are not novices disillusioned by the rigors of their training...
...enough on the road to post-counciliar reform. "There seemed to be such great conservatism and such lack of promise from updating my community," says one former nun, "that I felt there was no point in waiting for the next 50 years." Many spiritual rebels who have left the convent did so in the conviction that they could serve Christ far more effectively in secular life. Unless the orders accelerate the pace of change, believes Sister Jean Reidy of the Sisters of Humility of Mary, the prospect is for even greater losses. "Women who want to live committed Christian lives...
...reluctant to let them resume the lay state-and unhappy male clerics have little choice but to abandon their vocations in open defiance of the rules. By contrast, the church willingly dispenses nuns from their vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, and they can more easily leave the convent without leaving the church as well. Moreover, there has been a lessening of the family and social pressures that once tended to keep a girl in the nunnery, whether she was happy there...
...result, many convent partings are amicable. Even former nuns who get married are welcomed back to visit their old convents, and some, in fact, regard themselves as dedicated alumnae of their orders. A case in point is Mary Louise Prendergast, who left the Sisters of Loretto last year after 20 years as a nun. Although an unmarried laywoman now, she remains chairman of the science department at the Loretto Sisters' Webster College...
Nothing but Gratitude. Many former nuns remain in the grip of the idealism that led them to the convent-and are seeking new ways to live out this ideal in secular life. One such experiment is the Community of Christian Service in Pueblo, Colo., founded last summer by 13 former Sisters of Notre Dame. The women took private vows of chastity and poverty, live and pray together in a house rented from the diocese. When not pursuing secular occupations-most of them are teachers-they do welfare work among the poor of Pueblo...