Monday 1 June 2015

Amen Sister

Apparently women are flocking to the sisterhood in record numbers as the Catholic Church announce that the number of new nuns has trebled in five years although nobody seems to know why.
One reason offered is that the Church have recently thrown open its doors in a recruitment drive with taster weekends for anyone who is considering the Churchy life and they now hold open days where nuns are on hand to explain just what is expected and how to join them.  
A deeper explanation offered is that women are rejecting the sexualised, materialistic and male driven world we inhabit.
The Church of England has not seen a rise in aspiring nuns though, their number of recruits have almost halved in the past decade while the Catholic Convent's are having to build new or extend their premises.
I can't find an explanation either to explain it but the route from your everyday Catholic to nun is a long process as it takes six years from the first phrase to taking the final vows.  
The criteria is you must obviously be a Catholic, be single or widowed, have no children under 16 and be free from debt.
After a four week phase to test your aptitude for the religious life and if the nuns agree that you are ready for a life of flat shoes and praying, you progress to the next stage where you given twelve months to dispose of all your worldly goods and once you are stood before them without the proverbial pot and just the shirt on your back, they then remove your shirt and give you as habit and a new name.
What follows is two years of praying and the reward of 'probationary nun' followed by three years of more praying which ends with a celebration as you become a fully fledged nun and you are free to do whatever it is that nuns do. 
As my knowledge of nuns stretches to the movies i assume what they do is move into families with many children, sing and enter music festivals but you may want to double check that before applying.

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